


can you lead me to the light (this is where we come alive)

by OsleyaKomWonkru



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Declarations Of Love, Episode: s06e03 The Children of Gabriel, Episode: s07e02 The Garden, F/F, Gen, Healing, Love, Mentions of self-harm, Peace, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Skyring, Temporal Anomaly, mentions of cannibalism, mentions of disordered eating, some sexual content
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-30
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:54:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 26,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27798823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OsleyaKomWonkru/pseuds/OsleyaKomWonkru
Summary: Knowing that Octavia needs someone in her corner, Niylah stows away with Octavia when the second transport ship goes down to Sanctum. When their adventures in the forest lead them to the Anomaly, Niylah, Octavia and Diyoza discover that the world on the other side, which they later come to call Skyring, is precisely the new start that they need in their lives. As years pass and peace and healing become real, any desire to return to Sanctum fades away.A canon-divergent domestic Niytavia-on-Skyring fic.
Relationships: Charmaine Diyoza & Hope Diyoza, Charmaine Diyoza & Niylah, Hope Diyoza & Niylah, Octavia Blake & Charmaine Diyoza, Octavia Blake & Hope Diyoza, Octavia Blake/Niylah
Comments: 8
Kudos: 27
Collections: t100fic4blm Donation Celebration





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I started writing this fic months ago, shortly after 7x02 aired, not really with a destination in mind, just a fun exploration of the possibilities of Octavia and Niylah living a life together on Skyring with Diyoza and Hope.
> 
> Then it came to my attention that other people were also interested in cottagecore Niytavia, so a special event in the [The 100 Fic for Black Lives Matter Initiative](https://t100fic-for-blm.carrd.co) has given me an opportunity to tidy it up and start posting! To see the fanart by @sparklyfairymira that goes along with this fic, check out [this post](https://sparklyfairymira.tumblr.com/post/636222259635372032/here-are-the-gifs-that-were-made-for-the) on Tumblr!
> 
> At time of posting this first chapter, I’ve got about 33k of this fic written with no end in sight, so it’s going to be a nice slow meandering exploration of the life they build together.
> 
> There is some explicit sexual content, but it can also be skipped over if that isn't your thing.
> 
>  **Warning:** Mentions of disordered eating, cannibalism and self-harm.
> 
> Trigedasleng: 
> 
> Okteivia - Octavia  
> Naila - Niylah  
> Ani - Aunt  
> Snogon - lover  
> Ai niron - my love  
> Ai Okteivia - my Octavia

“I’m going and you can’t stop me.” Octavia hissed from her hiding spot, just around the corner from the transport ship docking area, as Niylah wormed her way into it as well.

“Have you thought about this, _Okteivia?”_ Niylah whispered, pushing Octavia deeper into the crevice, so if the others came by they wouldn’t hear them. “It’s dangerous down there. You heard what that woman said.”

“I have to save my brother.” Octavia tried to force her way past Niylah, but there wasn’t enough room for her to squeeze through.

“You have to save yourself first.” Niylah shifted her position so that she was blocking any sort of exit completely. “You’re hurt. You need time to heal.”

“It’s just a few bruises, nothing I haven’t had before.”

“I’m not talking about that fight.” Niylah seized Octavia’s head in both her hands, and while Octavia tried to squirm away, there was nowhere for her to go. “I’m talking about what brought you there. You’re not well, _Okteivia._ Everything that’s happened, it’s broken you. Not your body, but your spirit. You need peace in which to heal and you’re not going to get that on the ground.”

“I’m not going to get that _locked up_ in this box in the sky either.” Octavia practically spat at her. “I’ve been locked up for most of my life. Counting down the days until I’d die. The only time I really felt _alive_ was on the ground.”

Niylah nodded thoughtfully. “Okay. I’ll concede that point. But I’m going with you. To make sure that you do actually work on healing yourself. That you don’t just throw yourself into fight after fight trying to feel something.”

Octavia huffed. “Fine.” She fell silent and they pressed back against the walls as the others passed by, not taking any notice of them. “Let’s go.”

* * *

Abby was not thrilled to see Octavia on the ground, but Niylah kept her silent with a glare, keeping herself as a buffer between Octavia and Abby as they raced through the forest. Their prisoner stopped them before they could run into some sort of shield, and Niylah had to pull back first Octavia, then Raven, as each of them almost charged into it.

Shield safely down, they passed through, and Niylah squeezed Raven’s arm wordlessly in consolation as she wept at Shaw’s grave. There was no time to linger though, and in short order they continued making their way through the compound, up to the village on the top of the plateau in the middle.

Niylah’s heart leapt into her throat as she saw Clarke, Bellamy and Murphy laid out on the ground, but she relaxed as she saw Clarke and Bellamy regain consciousness, though Murphy, as of yet, did not. She moved to Octavia’s side, rubbing her wrist in reassurance as her face fell from her brother’s rebuke.

“Don’t worry about him.” Niylah murmured into her ear. “Focus on my voice. Focus on the possibilities that this place could provide.”

Octavia closed her eyes, though Niylah wasn’t sure if she was trying to focus on Niylah’s voice or on shutting her out. There was no time to find out, as suddenly they were surrounded by crowds of locals, first children, then adults, some of them brought Murphy back to life, the others herded them into a tavern where they were to stay until something was decided about their presence there.

Octavia planted herself on a barstool away from the others, and Niylah sat down beside her, positioned to play gatekeeper if anyone approached, which they didn’t.

The leaders of the community returned to the room, saying that they needed to bring the transport into the compound, and Echo volunteered herself and Octavia as part of the team. Niylah didn’t ask, and rose as Octavia did.

“Niylah, I could really use you here to watch over Murphy.” Abby said.

Niylah gave her a cold glare. “I’m not here for you.”

She left with Octavia, Echo, Raven and Bellamy.

* * *

Bellamy was against engaging with the people holding the dropship, but from their vantage point, Niylah could see the prone bodies of Madi, Gaia and Diyoza - if they were just injured or if they were dead, it was too far away to be sure. But Niylah knew Octavia, and knew that she considered Madi and Gaia _her people_ and so she didn’t stop her as she charged out to take them on.

Sometimes one had to fight. This was one of those times. They’d been told these people were dangerous, and they’d already hacked up the bodies that they’d brought down from the mothership. Negotiation seemed inappropriate.

But that didn’t stop Bellamy from laying into Octavia afterward, as Niylah lifted up Madi and brought her into the control room. Echo had brought Gaia, and as Niylah returned back to the door to bring Octavia in, instead she found Bellamy, closing the door, and no Octavia to be seen.

“Where is she?” Niylah demanded to know.

“She’s not coming back with us. All she does is destroy. We can’t risk our peace.”

“She took out half a dozen of those people’s enemies almost entirely by herself while the rest of you were cowards.” Niylah snarled at him. “Open that door at once.”

“I’m not bringing her back into Sanctum, Niylah. It’s not going to happen.”

Niylah bodychecked a shocked Bellamy out of the way and pulled the lever open again. He stayed on the ground, too surprised to react.

“If she goes, I go.”

“Why do you still support her?”

“Someone has to look out for her, and you’re doing a terrible job of it. I’ll keep your sister alive, even if it is against her will.”

“What the hell do you mean?”

“She’s suicidal, Bellamy. She has been for years. You and _Wanheda_ just made it worse. But she still keeps coming back for more with you. You hurt her over and over again and she still wants your approval. You don’t deserve her love.” Niylah spat. “We don’t need your _Sanctum._ I’ll help her find her peace, and if I have any say in the matter, she’ll never see you again because all you bring her is pain.”

Niylah left the dropship without looking back.

* * *

It took Niylah some time to pick up Octavia’s trail in the dark, but she did, tracking her as she heard groans up ahead, seeing Octavia taken by more of the forest people, along with a child from the fortified compound.

Niylah tracked them through the night, staying out of sight, waiting to make her move to free Octavia and the child. That opportunity only came after the sun came up, and, much to her sorrow, after Octavia took more beatings in as many days as she refused to reveal the information that they sought.

But the moment came, and Octavia and the child fled into the forest with her, following her path back toward Sanctum, only to come straight into tragedy as a Sanctum guard fired around them at those chasing them, and catching the young girl in the chest.

The guard’s howls of sorrow reverberated through the forest as Diyoza materialized behind her, taking down the others giving chase with expert shots.

“I guess our deal’s off because of your own carelessness.” Diyoza quipped at the guard.

“There’s more of them to hunt.” Octavia said. “They weren’t all here.”

The guard passed the motorcycles on to the three of them, and Niylah and Octavia had a new partner in the forest - their former enemy, yet someone who Niylah could respect, given the respect she gave Octavia in those first moments.

The forest awaited.

* * *

Standing in front of the Anomaly in all of its glory, Niylah could barely remember the sequence of events that had brought them there. The toxin still swirled heavy in the air around them, and it kept showing her flashes of Octavia, though the real Octavia was a shivering mess beside her, the temporal flare having done something strange to her arm - and it was spreading.

Their only hope lay here, at the source of the flares, the source of everything mysterious on this planet.

“Should she touch it?” Niylah asked Gabriel. “What exactly do we do here?”

“We go in.” Diyoza said with wonder, one hand on her pregnant belly while the other reached ahead, as if being beckoned. “Hope.”

“No, wait.” Octavia yelled out to her, and Niylah tried to hold her back, but Diyoza disappeared into the yellow-green lights nonetheless.

Octavia dove towards the light as well, and Niylah stayed by her side, supporting her weight as they staggered into it together.

* * *

They surfaced together too, coughing out mouthfuls of water. Niylah looked down, seeing the green glow far below them.

“Niylah!” Octavia said, treading water, seeming surprised to see her.

“I’m here.” Niylah said. “I told you I was with you.”

“Even into… that.” Octavia looked down. “I… the last few days are confusing.”

“It may come back to you. Or it may not. But it seems your mind is starting to clear?”

“Clear as a whistle.” Octavia looked down to her left hand. “My arm’s better too.”

“Good. That’s good. You’re cured.” Niylah smiled. “Now how’s about we get to shore and see where Diyoza’s disappeared to?”

They swam for shore, shedding their heavy Children of Gabriel gear as they made it up onto the beach. Supporting each other’s weight for a bit as they rested from the swim. Niylah looked up into the sky - a very different sky than one she’d ever seen - for it had a strange ring that seemed to circle the earth.

“I don’t think we’re on Sanctum anymore.” Niylah said, pointing. “Look.”

“A new planet?” Octavia asked. “Did that take us to a completely different planet?”

“Looks like it.”

Before they could think on it further, a loud scream - Diyoza’s - tore through the air, and they both took off running towards the sound of it.

Passing through the woods into a clearing, they stopped dead at the sight of a cabin, alone in the woods, surrounded by garden beds. Another scream came from inside, and they booked it to the door.

Octavia flung it open first, and they crowded in, much to Diyoza’s surprise.

“Look who it is.” Diyoza marveled. “Oh ow - just in time, the baby’s coming.”

“What do you mean?” Niylah asked. “You’re only six months pregnant.”

“I’ve been here for three.”

Octavia and Niylah exchanged a puzzled look, but there was no time for more. The baby was coming, and Diyoza needed their help.

“You’re lucky I’ve done this before.” Niylah said, directing Octavia to give Diyoza moral support while she prepared to help deliver the baby. Before her mother had been taken by the mountain, she’d been a midwife, and Niylah had often gone along to assist in her teen years. Now all of that knowledge came flooding back.

Diyoza’s labour was faster than others she’d attended - but then, the baby had almost been crowning by the time they arrived. Niylah cleaned up the baby girl and placed her in Diyoza’s arms as she woke up, and she and Octavia crowded around to see the little girl gurgle in her mother’s arms.

“Hope.” Diyoza said. “Meet Octavia and Niylah. My friends.”

* * *

Octavia had been ready to dive back into the lake to go for the Anomaly as soon as Diyoza and Hope were settled, but Niylah held her back.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“To the Anomaly.”

“What do you hope to find there?”

“My brother.”

Niylah sighed. _“Okteivia,_ he doesn’t deserve you. Please. Just stop for a minute. Remember what you promised me. And now we have _time._ Time passes differently here than it does in Sanctum.”

“If I heal myself, will you let me go then?”

“If you heal yourself, then you might finally choose what is best for yourself and not want to go.”

“I can’t promise that.”

“You will.”

* * *

For the first few months, Octavia and Niylah slept on the roof. Octavia couldn’t bear the thought of being confined beneath a roof again and Niylah couldn’t say that she liked the thought either. Sleeping on the roof together at least gave Octavia someone to turn to when her nightmares woke her, or when her night terrors didn’t and Niylah had to wake her instead.

All of that was perhaps easier done on the roof instead of in the cabin with a young baby. While sound certainly traveled, it didn’t travel as intensely as it would have if they’d all been in the same room, so Niylah knew Diyoza was grateful for it.

As the weeks went on, something began to shift between Niylah and Octavia. While at first Octavia only accepted Niylah’s comforting arms after she’d had a nightmare or night terror, now Octavia began to snuggle into her from the start.

The night disturbances grew fewer too, Niylah noted.

Then one morning as the sun’s rays hit Niylah’s face, she was about to open her eyes when she realized she felt something that she hadn’t felt before - Octavia’s hand resting on her hip, thumb rubbing over her hip bone. She kept her eyes closed and tried to keep her breathing steady, but as she felt Octavia’s warm breath ghosting over her cheek, she was sure Octavia had caught on.

“I know you’re awake.” Octavia murmured in her ear, voice huskier than usual.

Niylah cracked an eye open to find Octavia’s green eyes staring at her intently, her hand still on her hip. “I am. Did you want something?”

“I had a question.”

“Yes?”

“Why did you wake me up? From cryosleep, I mean?”

“Because it wasn’t fair that they were keeping you a prisoner on ice.”

“Why did you leave the dropship after my brother kicked me out?”

“Because I didn’t want you to die.”

“Why did you follow me into the unknown of the Anomaly?”

“Because I love you.”

Octavia’s breath caught in her throat. “I love you too.” She whispered, lowering her head slowly, and Niylah rose up to meet her in a soft kiss.

Octavia pulled away from the kiss after a long moment, breathing heavy but expression confused. “I love you, but I don’t know how you can love someone like me.”

 _“Okteivia,_ you don’t have to pretend with me. You know that, because I know you. I know everything that you’ve done. I’ve been there for all of it. And I’m still here. You want to know why?”

“Why?”

“Because I know the truth. I know what no one else wanted to know, and what you even hide from yourself, because you believe it is better to be hated than to burden your people with the truth of your sacrifices. But you don’t need to worry about them anymore. They have a home. You have a home. You can have peace in a way that they never thought you could. And you have me. Always.”

“You really mean that?”

“I do.”

Octavia smiled - wider than Niylah had seen in years, save for when she was playing with Hope - but now it was directed at her. Her hand tightened on Niylah’s hip and Octavia settled back down onto the roof, pulling their hips together as their lips met once again.

Niylah ran her hand over Octavia’s back, pulling her closer there as well, and they continued to rock against each other lazily, trading soft kisses as the sun warmed their skin in the morning light.

A ball of fabric flying up onto the roof and striking Niylah’s knee broke them out of their reverie.

“Hey, lovebirds!” Came Diyoza’s voice. “There’s still laundry to be done.”

Octavia dropped her forehead to Niylah’s shoulder, chuckling with embarrassment, while Niylah strained to look over the edge of the roof, catching Diyoza’s amused expression.

“You may wish to remember that there’s a window right here.” Diyoza said. “That my bed is right next to. You may want to choose a different part of the roof in the future if you don’t want an eavesdropper.”

“We will remember that.” Niylah laughed, stroking Octavia’s hair as she continued to giggle into her shoulder.

“It was about time.” Diyoza said fondly. “But come on. Work to do.”

Niylah and Octavia extricated themselves from one another, crawling down from the roof and preparing for their morning chores. Niylah hauled the laundry basket up onto her hip, while Octavia swung their buckets over her shoulder, ready to head to the closest mountain stream for fresh water. They each pressed a kiss to Hope’s forehead before heading down towards the lake.

Octavia stole a few more kisses from Niylah when they reached the beach, after which she continued on along the lakefront to the stream, and Niylah settled in to do the washing.

Niylah had just finished hanging the washing on the washline when Octavia returned to the cabin, laden with their morning water haul. Hope finished nursing, and Diyoza placed her in her cradle and went over to the fire pit, ladling out their breakfast, stewed blueberries with a sort of boiled grain - no, not grain, actually a _seed,_ Niylah remembered - that Diyoza claimed resembled one from her childhood on Earth, that she called _quinoa._ The meadow beyond their home was rife with it, and they had dried stores that would be sufficient for weeks, as long as the air remained relatively dry.

There were many days where Niylah would find Octavia in their pantry corner, carefully counting and enumerating all of their food, calculating how long it could last. It had confused Diyoza at first, and while Diyoza had known about the Dark Year (Niylah assumed Kane, that traitor, had told her), she hadn’t realized how heavily that experience and that year had weighed on Octavia going forward. Niylah had taken her aside to tell her more of the story, the story that perhaps wasn’t publicly known. While Niylah couldn’t say that it had completely changed the way Diyoza interacted with Octavia, the older woman did approach her with a softer touch than before, recognizing Octavia’s trauma for what it was, rather than the front of bravado that still sometimes surfaced in moments of uncertainty.

But right now, there were only smiles to be had as the three of them ate their breakfasts around the fire pit, as Niylah and Octavia sat closer to each other than they had before, and Hope began to babble from her cradle, Diyoza rocking it with one hand.

“So what do we have to do today?” Octavia asked, looking at Diyoza, even as she nuzzled into Niylah’s shoulder.

“I’ll check over the garden, water and thin the root vegetables as needed. You two could go gather more berries, and salvage larger pieces of metal from that crashed ship. Would be nice to be able to build a tub so that if winter comes - or if we don’t want to wash in the lake - we can do that right here.”

“Do we have tools?”

“If there are tools that will help with larger sheets like that, they’ll be somewhere in that wreckage.”

“Then let’s hope we can get some sheets that aren’t too corroded.” Octavia said, taking their empty bowls to the dish station, washing them out quickly and hanging them to dry. “Does Hope have some good luck kisses for Aunty O and _Ani_ N?”

Octavia lifted Hope out of her cradle to the little girl’s delight, and as asked, she pressed some messy kisses to Octavia and Niylah’s cheeks as Octavia tickled her belly. All the giggles started to get Hope gurgling instead of giggling, so Octavia grabbed one of the cloths off the washline and burped her against her shoulder instead, rubbing her back until she was fine again before handing her back to Diyoza.

“Shall we go?” Octavia asked, reaching a hand out to Niylah.

“Let’s just grab some bowls for the berries, yeah?” Niylah reminded her, taking her hand.

Octavia blushed. “Right. Of course.”

“Have fun.” Diyoza called after them as they dashed off into the forest, perhaps a bit _too_ quickly, hand in hand.

* * *

The crashed ship was about three miles from the cabin, and given the Eligius logos on it, that suggested it was one of the other exploration ships, like the one that had brought the Primes to Sanctum. But given its state, it seemed unlikely that there had been many survivors, and not enough to establish a society - just the one cabin that they’d moved into.

Octavia and Niylah wove their way to the ship down through their familiar berry patches, and harvest season was in full swing. As far as the eye could see, there were berries ready to be harvested.

“What do we do with all of these?” Octavia asked, worry rising in her voice. “We need to preserve them somehow.”

“We’ll come back later with more buckets, and then we can dry them.” Niylah said, setting her bowls down and rubbing Octavia’s shoulders. _“Snogon,_ we need to talk about this. We all suffered through the years in the bunker, but it seems that it is only you who is worried about counting every grain and berry.”

“I… I always felt responsible to make sure everyone could eat. That there were enough rations for everyone.” Octavia whispered, looking away. “Now it feels even more important, because Hope’s survival depends on _our_ survival, she’s helpless otherwise, we need to survive, we…”

“We will survive, _snogon.”_ Niylah murmured, wrapping her arms around Octavia and pressing kisses to the side of her head. “There is plenty on this planet, and there’s just the four of us. There are berries, there are nuts and seeds, there are vegetables, there is that quinoa that Diyoza makes. There’s even the jellyfish.” Niylah wrinkled her nose. “They’re not the most delicious thing in the world, but we’ve eaten worse. And that’s not all. That’s only what we’ve found close to our home. We can go further if we must. Remember, if you’re on the ground, like we are, and not trapped in the sky or beneath the earth, there are many opportunities for food, even if the usual sources run out. Tree bark, insects, and so on. You don’t have to worry.”

“Are you sure, _Naila?”_

“Absolutely positive.” Niylah assured her. “Here. You see all of these berries? How many different kinds would you say there are?”

“Well there’s the blueberries, there’s the redberries, the blackberries… the ones over there on those bigger bushes are the - what did Diyoza call them?”

“Those sour orange ones? She called them sea buckthorn. A name from her time.”

“And then there’s the whiteberries over there… so at least five different kinds.”

“I see three more too - sunberries, moonberries and bellberries. All ones we know we can eat. That’s eight different types of berries in this patch of forest alone. We know there are three more patches like this within a few minutes’ walk of the cabin. All of which likely look like this one does. So we have plenty to harvest.”

“How will we get them all before they go bad?”

“The ones in this patch? We’re going to eat them right now.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just what I said. Pick them, and eat them as you pick them. Do not fill your bowls until you’ve filled your belly to bursting.”

“I…”

“It’s all right, _Okteivia._ We lack for nothing here. Haven’t you ever eaten so much you could barely stand?”

“No. Never. I… I barely even know what it is like to feel _full._ I’ve felt that more the past few months than I ever have before in my life, it’s such a contrast to the hunger I’ve always lived with but didn’t really know any different. It was normal for me to feel a bit of pain in my stomach from not having enough food.”

“Oh…” Niylah wasn’t sure what to say to that, but she plucked a redberry off the bush next to them and lifted it to Octavia’s lips. “Today we put an end to that. You should always feel satisfied after a meal. If you don’t, then please say something, and Diyoza and I will make sure you have some more food. Can you promise me that?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Now start with this one, perfectly fresh and juicy.”

Octavia opened her mouth to accept the berry, but didn’t miss a chance to envelop Niylah’s fingers as she did so, slipping them from her mouth with a pop, leaving a hint of redberry juice on Niylah’s fingers and she chewed and swallowed. The grin that followed showed her teeth stained with the redberry juice as well, as Niylah stood there in a daze with her fingers still out.

“My turn.” Octavia’s voice had the same husky quality it had that morning, as Octavia reached past Niylah to the further blackberry bush, and offered the fruit up to Niylah.

Niylah’s eyes darkened as she did the same as Octavia had, closing her lips over the berry and Octavia’s fingers at the same time. Octavia’s breath hitched as Niylah’s tongue slid suggestively over her fingers as she pulled back.

They traded berries at those bushes for quite some time, until their teeth and fingers were stained red and black, and then moved over to the sea buckthorn bush, enjoying the sour taste of the orange berries, as well as the tart whiteberries on the next bush.

Once they finished raiding a patch of low-growing blueberries, Niylah grabbed Octavia around the waist and tumbled her into the grass on the edge of the clearing, hovering over her as she tried to catch her breath from the surprise.

“Are you full?”

“Definitely.” Octavia groaned, rubbing her belly. “I lost count at seventy.”

“You were counting?”

“Yes.”

 _“Okteivia, ai niron,_ you don’t have to do that.” Niylah traced Octavia’s jawline with one of her berry-stained fingers. “We ate so many berries and look - they’re still everywhere. There are still many that we will take back for Diyoza, and for us to eat later. And more to harvest in the other patches besides. You now know that you can stuff yourself full of berries, more than you’d eat on a normal day, and there are still plenty here that we can eat with other food too. Okay?”

“Okay.”

Octavia reached up and pulled Niylah down on top of her, kissing her and tracing her lips with her tongue, and Niylah opened to her. They traded open-mouthed kisses there in the grass, straddling each other’s thighs for a bit of light friction.

They almost fell into a doze there on the edge of the berry patch, when a ray of light streamed through the trees just at the right angle to hit Octavia in the face as Niylah shifted her position.

“What is Diyoza going to say?” Octavia mumbled, running her fingers through Niylah’s hair as her head was pillowed on her shoulder.

“She’ll be glad that we’ve addressed some of your issues with food. This is a part of your healing and she knows that.”

“You sure?”

“Yes. We won’t bring back metal for the tub today, we should see what we can do about metal netting or wiring of some sort, so that we can construct drying racks for the berries. We need to harvest and dry them this week, the tub can wait if it must.”

“I don’t know if I can move.”

“Then we ate the right amount of berries.” Niylah grinned, sitting up and reached out her hands, pulling Octavia to sitting with a groan. “Let’s go see what we can find at the ship, then come back here and harvest what we can with the bowls we have, then come back after lunch for more.”

“I don’t think I’m going to need lunch.”

“We’ll see when we get there.”

* * *

Niylah spotted several more berry bushes along their way to the ship, not in such large numbers as that one patch, but enough that she made a mental note to bring any buckets or containers that they found in the ship to collect those too on their way back.

Once they were at the wreckage, they wormed their way inside through a broken vent, one of the only access points as it seemed it had crashed with the door slamming into the cliff face behind them, the main bit of trouble that the ship had encountered - though given the angle, it was possible it had already encountered trouble on the way down and that’s why it had crashed in the first place.

In the bowels of the ship, they lit torches with the lighters that they left there specifically for the purposes of exploring - they had a limited amount of fuel that still existed in the ship, and other fire-making methods didn’t work so well in a metal box.

“Look. These grates here.” Octavia said, motioning with her torch. “Perhaps these were some sort of air filters for the ventilation system, you can see them in several different grate sizes.”

“Excellent, help me get them loose.”

Octavia yanked off the outer cover, the old screws giving way easily, and they wiggled the inner grates out of the ventilation system, four of them in all.

“If we can find two more vents like this, then we should have plenty to work with.” Niylah said.

“Keep an eye out for tools that can help us strip the walls of the ship for Diyoza’s tub.” Octavia called out as they split up to circle through the halls. “If we can’t bring those sheets back this time, at least we’ll be ready to go next time.”

Niylah didn’t find another vent, but she did find a box of tools in one corner, and dragged the box back to their entry point, where Octavia was counting the number of grates she’d collected.

“Tools?” Octavia asked.

“Lots of them. I don’t even know what most of them are called.”

“Excellent. I found enough of these grates, so we should be good to go.”

“If you start taking those outside, I just want to grab some more containers for the berries we saw on our way here to the ship.” Niylah made her way back around two corners, and pushed a locker door open to scoop up some more sturdy plastic containers that may have contained provisions at one point or another, but that had long since been picked clean. They’d clean them in the stream just outside, and then they’d be good to hold more berries.

* * *

Their walk back to the main berry patch not far from their home filled up all of their containers, full of blackberries, whiteberries and sea buckthorn. Diyoza was making her rounds of the garden with her watering can, Hope in a cloth sling next to her chest, as they came back into the clearing.

“That doesn’t look like metal sheeting.” Diyoza commented, looking at the two weighed down by the grates and each balancing a collection of bowls and other containers.

“Change of plans.” Niylah said, swinging the grates off her back and carefully stacking her containers of berries on the edge of the garden bed. “There are a lot of ripe berries, I promised Octavia we’d collect and dry them so we have them for winter.”

“Solid plan. The sheeting can wait.” Diyoza nodded. “Who’s hungry? I’ll get lunch ready.”

“I…” Octavia looked at Niylah uncertainly. “We ate a lot of berries. And I mean a lot.”

“Does that mean you’re still full, or does that mean you don’t think you need to eat?” Niylah asked gently, taking Octavia’s berry containers and adding them to her own.

Octavia looked uncertain, not sure how to answer. Diyoza broke the tension.

“There’s a jellyfish simmering in the pot. I’ll chop it up, add some spices and fry it up. Eat some of that, then decide if you want any of the salad on the side.”

“Okay.” Octavia said, picking up Niylah’s rope of grates and adding it to her own. “I’ll go wash these off in the lake in the meantime.”

Octavia pressed a kiss to Niylah’s cheek and took off towards the lake, her body language suggesting that she wanted to be alone.

“She may have felt like we were ganging up on her.” Niylah observed as she watched Octavia disappear behind the trees. “She knows she has to address her fears about food, but I don’t know how to make it easier for her.”

“There’s nothing to do about it besides provide that security that we won’t be starving.” Diyoza said, handing Hope to Niylah and making her way over to the firepit, scooping the jellyfish out of the pot with a large fork and dropping it on the cutting board, cutting out the innards and chopping up the rest. “I know what it’s like to not know where your next meal is coming from. Life before the first apocalypse wasn’t an easy one. But I only experienced that in fits and spurts, nothing like what you had in the bunker, trying to make sure an entire society survived on practically nothing.”

“She told me she’s only really known what it’s like to be full since arriving here. She’s never had enough to eat. In space, she was illegal. Her food would have come from her mother and brother sharing their already meager rations with her.”

“So we make sure that she has no cause to worry.” Diyoza said, looking away from her meal preparation, meeting Niylah’s eyes. “I might not be her lover like you, but I do love her as family. I want her to heal and flourish here in this miracle of a place we’ve been given. We’re agreed on that, yeah?”

“Of course.”

“Good. I know her nightmares have been getting better, the closer you’ve gotten to her.”

“I do what I can. All we can do is be there for her as she fights her demons and make sure she knows that she’s loved.”

“You’re good for her.” Diyoza commented, turning back to her work. “I was worried at first that you’d be one of her yes-men that followed her every move, but you’re not.”

“I’m not a soldier or an adviser. I’m the only one she had as a friend down there. No one else understood the pain she was in. No one else cared to even find out. I know she didn’t tell me about all of her sorrows and she insisted on carrying a lot by herself, never speaking of it to me, but I did what I could. That’s why I woke her, even when the others said to leave her asleep - she deserved the chance to process everything she’d been through and heal from it, and I wasn’t going to let that be some nebulous time in the future when it was convenient for the others. After everything she sacrificed, she deserved better.”

“It’s a good thing you did, otherwise I’d be preparing to give my child up to the people in Sanctum.”

“They would have taken your child and left you in the woods?”

“I thought that would be a better deal for her. But now we know that there was a better option. A safe and secure and beautiful option where we could all grow together. So thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

* * *

Niylah had just started to worry if Octavia was coming back at all when she did finally reappear, propping up the grates around the fire without a word to dry them off.

It didn’t miss Niylah or Diyoza’s notice that Octavia’s hair was wet, though her clothes were mostly dry.

Diyoza handed them each a plate of fried jellyfish, and made an excuse to disappear into the cabin with Hope.

Octavia began to eat mechanically, not looking up through her still-damp hair. So it would be up to Niylah then, to bring it up.

“Did you try swimming to the Anomaly?” Niylah asked.

Octavia nodded once. “I’m sorry, I - this feels overwhelming sometimes. But I didn’t dive down. I know I can’t get that far. I just wanted to feel like I _could._ Otherwise it feels too much like being trapped again.”

Niylah set her plate aside and wrapped her arms around Octavia’s waist. “You can’t run away from your own mind, you know. It will be wherever you are. Dealing with the things that haunt you will be much easier here than anywhere else. Let us help you.”

“Us?”

“Diyoza cares about you too, you know that.”

“I… I just don’t know how to do any of this.”

“That’s why we’re here to help you. We’re going to make you feel safe and secure. So you don’t have to worry. And when you have that, then you can begin to heal.”

“I already feel better knowing you’re with me.”

“And I’m glad for that. But it is more than knowing that you’re loved. You need to learn to love yourself again too.”

“I don’t know how I’ll ever be able to do that.”

“It takes time. It won’t happen overnight. But you have the space in which to do that without judgment. And with love.” Niylah let go of Octavia, kissed her shoulder and picked up her plate again. “Now, finish your jellyfish. We can rig up the berry trays with the haul we have before we go out for more.”

* * *

Octavia and Niylah visited two more of their berry patches before dark, hauling bucket after bucket back to their cabin, where Diyoza took care of the drying process, aided by the fires and the hot sun. While they didn’t know the movement of the seasons on this planet, they’d arrived in what felt like spring, and now it felt like midsummer, the seasons somewhat longer than they were on Earth.

Niylah didn’t know if they could expect a winter, or how strong or mild it could be, but she knew they needed to be prepared for any possibilities, to calm Octavia’s nerves more than anything else.

Which, given that their pantry corner was starting to get quite full, meant that it was time to start considering the trapdoor in the floor with the odd phoenix symbol emblazoned on it. Niylah tried not to think about how similar it looked to the Second Dawn logo, and as soon as she’d seen it the first time - while Octavia was at the lake, thankfully - she told Diyoza in no uncertain terms that Octavia wasn’t to see it and that they had to cover it somehow. A rug had been sufficient for the time being, but something more permanent was needed.

A week before Octavia had declared her love to her, Niylah had been able to concoct a red paint from some of the non-edible berries in a patch near the quinoa, and painted over the phoenix logo while Octavia was off hauling water. Which meant that now, they needed to find some way into the cellar to have a place to store the vegetables that were beginning to grow in their garden.

But that wasn’t a concern for that night, not yet. Octavia’s mood had improved considerably as they picked more and more berries, making sure to leave enough on the branches to go to seed so they’d have berries again the next years. Drying them would give them plenty to live on for months.

So when night fell and they said goodnight to Diyoza and Hope, Niylah made sure they bedded down on the corner of the roof furthest from Diyoza’s bed.

Octavia was laying on her back, Niylah curled against her side, both of them seemingly waiting for something. Octavia’s eyes were open, staring up at the glowing band in the sky that showed that the planet they were on was something different than what they’d ever know before.

“You okay?” Niylah asked, kissing Octavia’s shoulder, running her hand over her stomach under their blankets.

“Mmmhmm.” Octavia said, turning her head and placing an absent-minded kiss to the top of Niylah’s head. “Just thinking.”

“You do too much of that.” Niylah scolded with an air of playfulness. “Sometimes you just need to let go.”

“Mmmhmm.” Octavia hummed again, resting her hand over Niylah’s where it lay on her own belly. “What kind of letting go did you have in mind?”

“Well, I could help you relax.” Niylah inched her hand down a bit, rubbing her fingertips along Octavia’s skin, just inside the waistband of her pants. “If you wanted.”

“Relaxing sounds nice.”

Niylah slipped her hand further down Octavia’s pants, bit by bit, as Octavia spread her legs to give her access, already letting out a soft moan as Niylah’s fingers first skimmed over her. She was wet and wanting, and it was only then that Niylah noticed the devious smirk on Octavia’s face, and how she’d only been playing at casual for the past few minutes. She knew exactly what she was doing.

Two could play that game. Niylah teased her with her long slim fingers, not dipping them inside though she could tell that Octavia desperately wanted it, instead just rubbing her clit, spreading her nether lips and teasing her entrance without actually giving her what she longed for.

Octavia whimpered, her hand reaching down to clamp around Niylah’s wrist. “That doesn’t seem like relaxing.” She stammered out.

“Have patience, _ai Okteivia.”_ Niylah whispered, kissing Octavia’s sweaty brow. “I’ll give you what you need.”

Without warning, she plunged three of her fingers in deep, making Octavia cry out loudly into the night, though she immediately clamped a hand over her mouth, stifling her moans as Niylah worked her long and hard until she clamped her legs around Niylah’s hand and shook as her orgasm overtook her whole body.

Niylah used her free hand to pull Octavia’s away from her mouth, kissing her softly, on her lips, along her jaw, down her sweaty neck as she pulled her hair back from it. One kiss on each eyelid before Octavia opened them again.

“Did that help?” Niylah asked, arching an eyebrow.

“Y - yes.” Octavia sighed, bucking against her hand as Niylah shifted her fingers again, pulling them out gently. “Wow.”

Octavia’s eyes darkened as Niylah licked her fingers clean of her, disappearing beneath the blankets, her breath suddenly hot on Niylah’s stomach, fingers playing with the drawstring of her pants.

“Let me help you relax too.” Octavia whispered against her skin, voice muffled by the blankets.

“I don’t need to relax as much as you do, but if you want to make me feel good, then by all means.”

Octavia didn’t wait, she untied Niylah’s pants and bade Niylah to lift her hips so she could pull them down further, slipping in between Niylah’s knees, her breath ghosting over Niylah’s clit as she gave an experimental lick, this experience new to her. Feeling Niylah shift closer to feel more of her, Octavia felt encouraged and emboldened to settle in closer, her lips and tongue and fingers bringing Niylah closer and closer to her peak, tumbling over it with a sharp gasp and a soft moan.

Octavia peeked out of the blankets, still between Niylah’s shaking knees, to look up at her. “So did that make you feel good?”

Niylah smirked. “Most definitely, _ai niron._ Most definitely.”

* * *

Diyoza had found the key to the trapdoor. It was time to see what was inside.

As the door hissed open, Octavia turned tail and ran out the door, Niylah and Diyoza close on her heels. They found her around the side of the cabin, sitting on the ground, clenching her fists as she tried to calm her breathing.

“Hey.” Niylah whispered, rubbing Octavia’s shoulders. “It’s okay.”

“I… I can’t. Not another space like that. I’m sorry. Maybe when I know what’s there, how it works, if there’s a way out -”

“I understand.” Niylah said, voice soft. “I understand.”

“Here, take care of Hope while we take a look.” Diyoza said kindly, handing Hope over to Octavia, a smile appearing on the latter’s face as she took the child in her arms. “We’ll yell if there are any problems.”

“Hopefully not.” Octavia said, attention fully on Hope now. “I’m not jumping into battle with this little one in my arms.”

Niylah pressed a kiss to Octavia’s forehead, and she and Diyoza went back inside to look into the abyss of darkness that dwelt in the foundation beneath their feet, beneath the home they’d already been living in for months.

There was a strange vibration in the air, but they couldn’t see anything, though there was a ladder. Niylah took one of their candlesticks off the wall, lighting the candle from the fireplace, and handed it to Diyoza.

“Does that mean I’m going first?” Diyoza asked her.

“If you wouldn’t mind?” Niylah asked, somewhat sheepishly. “I… I’m not as terrified of enclosed spaces as Octavia is, but they still make me nervous.”

“If I get eaten, you’re raising my daughter, remember that.”

“Wouldn’t forget it.”

Diyoza made her way down the ladder, and Niylah waited nervously to see what Diyoza’s light would cast into light.

“Incredible.” She heard Diyoza say.

“What is it?”

“Get down here.”

Nervously, Niylah made her way down the ladder as well, trusting that with Octavia on the outside, even if the door closed, she would be able to free them. Once she turned around, she saw at once what Diyoza was talking about.

A spherical object, hovering in the air, made of some sort of metal spiral, all sorts of symbols imprinted on it - symbols that were also carved into the walls surrounding them.

“What is it?” Niylah asked. “Have you ever seen anything like this before?”

“No.” Diyoza said in wonder. “Never read about anything like this either. This is unique.”

“Can we touch it?”

“Probably. No idea what the symbols mean, but we’re clearly not the first to be trying to figure that out, looking at all of these markings on the walls.”

Niylah went up close to the sphere, brushing her fingers over a letter O, one of the only symbols she recognized on the sphere. Nothing happened as she did so, however.

“On a more practical note.” Diyoza started, looking around them. “This space is good and dry. I was worried about moisture or humidity down here, but it looks solid. We’ll be able to store food down here without any issues.”

“Excellent. I’m sure Octavia will be glad to hear it.”

“I’m sure you are too.”

“Fair enough. Yes, I am. I don’t worry as much as she does, but I do still worry. I lived through the Dark Year too. The rationing we had during our entire time in the bunker.”

“I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

“We survived.”

“So what does human flesh taste like?”

Niylah whipped around to look at Diyoza. “You’re not serious?”

Diyoza shrugged. “I don’t want you to be afraid about talking about it because it is some big taboo. It was a part of your life, a part of your lives that left a huge trauma to deal with for both of you. If we don’t normalize talking about it, then it will stay that trauma.”

“There’s a difference between normalizing talking about it and normalizing… well, _it.”_

“Hey, I’m not suggesting that we start serving up people burgers. But I am curious. And right now I feel that you’re in a better state of mind to answer the question than Octavia is.”

“Well, it… tastes like meat. I expect if we’d had any sort of herbs and spices - or well, if we’d chosen to use them on this - then it might have tasted better. But the preparation we had was done without any sort of flavourings and to preserve as much nutrition as possible while also using as much of the person as possible so nothing went to waste. So it was less like steak and more like those jellied desserts I read about in a strange book when I was a child.”

“Jello human pops? That’s disgusting.”

“That was life. We didn’t… I guess the thought was that if we had to do it, there shouldn’t be anything pleasurable about it in any way.”

“I understand that reasoning, but still. Gagging on your friend somehow seems worse than making them palatable.”

“You respect your friend by accepting the sacrifice. Nothing more.”

“Well, looks like we’re done down here. Plenty of room for our stores. Nothing to worry about, no further trapdoors. We’ll be fine using it.”

Niylah nodded, turning her back on the sphere and heading back upstairs, not wanting to be down there any longer than she had to be.

She went back outside, finding Octavia. “Everything’s fine.” She told her, sitting down next to Octavia and Hope. “Plenty of room to store food for the winter. A good dry space too.”

“Nothing off about it?”

“Well, there is a large metal spiral with all sorts of symbols on it hovering in the middle of the room, but we can work around it.”

“Excuse me?”

“Just what I said.”

“A metal sphere, not tied to anything or supported by anything, just hovering in the air?”

“Yes. Like a spaceship.”

“Except it’s not. It’s underground. Where there’s gravity.”

“Do you want to see it?”

“I… maybe later. This little one has just fallen asleep.” Octavia looked down at the sleeping child in her arms with a fond expression. “It’s hard to imagine that with all of the horror in the universe, there’s still room for such innocence.”

“We were all innocent once.”

“Maybe you were. But I was a criminal from my first breath. Innocence isn’t something I ever knew. My earliest memories are from hiding under the floor, and the overwhelming _fear_ that came with that. When I was very little, Bellamy hid with me, and then when the space was too small for both of us it was just me, and… it scared me, each time, because I knew what would happen if they found me.”

“You’re not that little girl anymore.”

“But I’m still hiding.”

“Okteivia, being here instead of in Sanctum is not hiding.”

“Isn’t it? This place outside of space and time, not facing it all…”

“You mean not being tormented by the people who want you dead.” Niylah said, voice full of disapproval. “You are allowed to be happy, _Okteivia._ You are allowed to have peace.”

“It feels dishonest.”

“It isn’t. Diyoza and I were just talking about this, and it got me thinking. What we did to survive to get us here is just that - survival. But life is about more than just surviving. We survived so that we would have the opportunity to live again. This is that opportunity.”

“The last my brother saw of me was… I don’t even know how to describe it. How can I just leave him with that impression?”

“He doesn’t deserve to see you now. To see how you’ve started to heal, and how you’re going to continue healing. That’s what I told him.”

“What do you mean?”

“When I hit him and opened the transport ship door again so that I could go find you. I told him that I’d help you find peace and that he didn’t deserve you.”

“But if he doesn’t see it…”

“It is still real. You don’t need his approval, _ai niron._ You need your truth, and that doesn’t involve him at all. Just you.” She skipped a beat. “And I hope me. And Hope and Diyoza.”

Octavia was silent for a long time, looking off towards the lake, still rocking Hope in her arms. She turned and looked at the field of quinoa waving in the wind behind the cabin, to the flourishing garden beds in the other direction.

“Okay. I’ll try. I’ll try to be happy.”


	2. Chapter 2

Winter came.

Octavia and Niylah had started sleeping in the cabin several weeks before the snows arrived, after the frost started lacing the cabin roof, building an alcove for themselves behind the stacks of firewood. There was more firewood outside stacked next to the cabin, protected by more metal sheeting, and they anxiously awaited what life would look like when the snow did come.

It struck with a vengeance, rattling the windows and the door. Octavia and Niylah took turns sneaking outside, bundled up in all the clothes they had, to hammer metal sheeting over the wooden shutters to keep them more firmly in place. The howling winds made for a howling baby, as Hope began teething and there was precious little they could do for her besides rubbing cold fingers over her gums to soothe the ache.

The storms didn’t abate for three months. While their provisions were sufficient - three meals a day, which consisted of quinoa and berries for breakfast, roasted vegetables and nuts for lunch and a dinner of dried jellyfish and potatoes with herbs - Niylah did begin to wonder if the storms would ever end.

She knew Octavia worried about it too, as the walls of their sleeping alcove began to run low, even as they replenished the firewood from the stacks outside, her nightmares returned and her nighttime screams soon joined Hope’s.

But spring dawned.

One morning as if nothing had ever happened, the storms were over. The cabin was enveloped in warmth again, as sun began to warm the wood and stream in through the fireplace.

Niylah poked Octavia awake, and she stirred sleepily.

“What is it?”

“I think it’s over.”

Octavia listened, and bolted up out of bed, wrapping a blanket around her shoulders and going to the door, which had only been opened once a day for the past three months, just to bring in new firewood and harvest snow for drinking water.

The sun hit Niylah’s eyes as Octavia pulled it open, breathing a sigh of relief as the rays streamed over her face, the snow all around them already beginning to melt.

“We should fill up all the buckets, just in case the pass to the stream isn’t clear yet.” Octavia said.

“Always worrying.” Niylah murmured. “Don’t. Come back and enjoy this sunny morning.”

“Just give me a minute.”

Octavia pulled out their water buckets, and went outside to scoop some of the snowdrift against the front of the house into the buckets, carrying them back inside.

“I can’t believe you don’t want to enjoy this.” Octavia said, flopping back down next to Niylah. “We can go outside again. See the life around us.”

Niylah didn’t say anything, she just smiled, cupping Octavia’s cheek with her hand.

“What is it?” Octavia asked with a frown. “Did I say something weird?”

“Not at all. I’m just happy to see you wanting to _enjoy_ something.”

The dark stormy days of winter had not been easy on any of them, and perhaps harder on Diyoza than the others, since not only had she had a teething baby for much of the winter, but she also wasn’t used to being stuck in a space like this. Octavia and Niylah helped with Hope as much as possible, letting Diyoza process her thoughts as she needed. Earth before the bombs had had storms too, of course, but nothing as unceasing and unrelenting as this.

But they were lucky that the storms had stopped before they’d run out of firewood. That was the critical thing that Diyoza had been worried about, since there was a limited amount of space in which to store firewood, both inside and outside the cabin, while their dried food stores would have lasted them several more months at least.

“I enjoy this life.” Octavia said, returning to the present. “Being with you. Hope. Diyoza. I feel a peace I’ve never felt before. Even trapped in here for months on end, with nothing but each other for company, nothing to do besides -”

“Each other?” Niylah raised an eyebrow with a grin.

“Only when we’ve had the proper walls.” Octavia winked, taking a measure of the firewood walls around them, but pouting when she realized they weren’t high enough to keep them out of Diyoza’s sight should the older woman wake up.

“If the snow keeps melting like this, we can bring in the last of the firewood today, and go out in search of fallen trees to chop more firewood.” Niylah said, pulling Octavia close to her. “But first just hold me for awhile.”

Octavia kissed Niylah’s temple, and settled back into their niche, pulling Niylah close to her as they huddled under their blankets. The air still had a chill to it, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as the days when the wind had blown their rickety door open during the storms if it hadn’t been barricaded properly.

They fell into a light doze again, until Hope awoke, her cries ringing through the whole cabin as she sought comfort and breakfast from her mother.

“Guess it’s time to get up.” Niylah murmured, snuggling into Octavia’s chest. “But do we have to?”

“We do.” Octavia whispered, running her fingers through Niylah’s hair as Niylah rested her head on her shoulder. “We’ve been able to rest the past few months. But now… spring is coming, and there’s a world out there that we need to get to know again. See how things have changed, what we need to prepare for as the seasons start again.”

“Your first thought isn’t to see if the lake is unfrozen.”

“It isn’t.” Octavia said honestly. “I… the pull of the Anomaly is there, certainly, but not like it was before. Like I said, I like the life we’ve built. I like the peace. I understand it now, and I know why people want to protect it if it they have it. But I’d never had it before. Life was always a fight.”

“Isn’t it good to stop fighting?”

“It is. But this has also required circumstances where fighting isn’t necessary. I don’t think I could have this anywhere else. Wherever there are people, there is fighting. And I don’t long for people the way I used to when I was a child and also living with a small number of people.”

“I’m proud of you.”

“I’m proud of all of us, for making it through the winter.”

“Did the food situation still worry you?” Niylah propped herself up on one elbow.

“It did. But I remembered what you told me during the summer, that there were options. Even if we would have almost frozen half to death if we’d had to pursue them in the winter.”

“Well now we can have all the fresh jellyfish we want. Just go down to the lake, punch a hole in the ice if there is still ice on it, and throw in the nets.”

“I’ll be happy when the nuts are back on the trees, because jellyfish still isn’t the most delicious thing in the world.”

“As if you can talk.” Diyoza mumbled, coming into the main room, rubbing her eyes with one hand, the other arm cradling a nursing Hope. “You’ve eaten worse.”

Niylah froze. This was the first time Diyoza had joked about the Dark Year with Octavia, and she wasn’t sure how it would go over. Niylah and Octavia had had their own private jokes, and Diyoza and Niylah had talked about it, but Diyoza had yet to make a joke to Octavia directly.

“Because there’s worse doesn’t mean there can’t be better.” Octavia said, giving Diyoza a look. “That should be my and Niylah’s project this spring.”

“What’s that?” Niylah asked, turning to her in confusion.

“We should roam further than a day’s walk from here. Spend several days trekking, possibly finding some land animals. Seems odd that we haven’t seen any here in the months we’ve been here. It could just be that they avoid this lake because of the Anomaly. But we should check to be sure.”

Diyoza evaluated the possibilities. “Yeah, okay. But first I’d suggest climbing the mountain to see as far as possible in each direction, to figure out the best ways to go. It will still probably be a few weeks before the mountain paths are passable. When I got here I went some of the way up, just enough to see that there weren’t any other inhabited places nearby. But I was too pregnant to go further up the mountain.”

She sat down at the table, shifting Hope to burp her. “In the meantime, there are plenty of jobs to go around. Tapping the trees that we marked before winter set in. Planting the fast growing vegetables in half of the garden beds so that we can plant several crops of them throughout the growing season. Digging out the trees we felled in the fall and chopping them for firewood. Then felling the others that we marked, stripping the outer bark to dry for household use, the inner bark to dry and grind for flour, and then the interior hardwood to save for firewood.”

Niylah threw a dirty sock in Diyoza’s direction and buried her face back in Octavia’s shoulder.

* * *

Octavia and Niylah did eventually extricate themselves from their cocoon of blankets to undertake these new chores, leaving Diyoza to clear their outdoor fire pit to cook breakfast there for the first time in months. They were armed with five metal taps, a hammer and buckets with which to collect the tree sap, as well as shovels and sleds to start moving logs.

The air still had a chill to it, and both Octavia and Niylah were bundled up in layers of sweaters and coats as they trudged through the snow, pushing a shovel ahead of them to clear the way, though as they started to walk they warmed up and started to shed their excess layers, hanging them on clear tree branches they found along the way.

“Just over here are thetrees we’re tapping today.” Niylah motioned, having been tasked to that duty back in the fall, having had experience with tapping trees back on Earth. “We’ll do others on different days, no need to rush.”

“So what are we going to do with all of this sap that we collect?” Octavia asked. “We can’t boil all of it down into syrup if there’s going to be as much of it as you say.”

“Well, it does take a lot of sap to boil down into syrup.” Niylah said. “And we can tap new trees every day, so that we can have syrup and sugar for a good long while. But what we don’t boil we simply drink. It’s good for you. Has more minerals and vitamins than just plain water does. And we tested all of these trees at the tail end of the season last year, they’re safe.”

“And it’ll fill up one of these buckets? How long does it take?”

“We’ll be coming back to replace them several times today. We’ll get sap boiling into syrup on one of the fires before lunch already.”

“Then I guess we better get to work dragging the logs in this area back so that we’ll be back in time to change them.”

“I’ll show you how to tap them, and then we can do that.”

Niylah showed Octavia the process of cutting into the tree to make a hole, putting in the spile and they could already watch the sap _drip drip dripping_ into the bucket before moving on to the next tree. Niylah let Octavia do the two last ones, and she ran back to check on the first in the meantime, just a few hundred meters away. It was already beginning to coat the bottom of the bucket.

“Okay, we’re good to go.” Niylah said, returning to Octavia as she wiggled in the last spile and hung the bucket. “We have a couple of hours before we’ll need to change the buckets, so let’s get some logs back, eat breakfast, and come back and check on them.”

Some trees had fallen over the winter, battered about by the heavy storms, though those they would need a saw for, since they were not entirely detached from their roots. But there had been several felled trees already in the fall that had sat in the forest over winter, and Octavia and Niylah loaded them onto the sleds to push and pull them back to their path that would take them to the side of the cabin, where the propped them up against the side where the sun rose, so that they could dry out before being chopped up.

Once they made it back to the cabin with their second load of logs, Diyoza was ladling out their breakfasts, their usual quinoa and berries, and she also handed out additional mugs of berry tea to celebrate the end of the storm that had seemed never-ending.

“Well we learned a lesson from that.” Diyoza said, as they took seats on the chairs that Diyoza had dragged outside. “On this planet, you might be cabin-bound for months.”

“We’ve been through worse.” Octavia said, smiling at Niylah and resting her head on her shoulder as she sipped her tea, feeling the warmth spread through her chest.

“The other seasons have been longer too, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that winter has been as well.” Niylah declared. “Though, admittedly, even a long season shouldn’t have been that unrelenting. That does make me worry though.”

“What do you mean?” Octavia asked, sitting up, worry rising in her expression.

“If there’s a season of unrelenting snowstorms, there could be another like that of rainstorms.” Niylah explained. “While the advantage of rainstorms is that we can still fish and gather tree bark, albeit getting wet in the process, that could wash out freshly planted garden beds and make it difficult to dry anything. We managed to keep the interior of the cabin and the storeroom below dry during the snowstorms, but blowing snowstorms are drier than unrelenting rain, which could seep into the foundation and into the storeroom.”

Diyoza nodded carefully. “Since we didn’t have a season like that last year, we may have missed it, and thus that season could, theoretically, be coming now. So it would be worth being prepared for it. Transfer all of our remaining dried goods to our most airtight containers. Save the non-airtight containers for the fresh products that we’ll be getting now, such as the sap from the trees, the tree bark, and so on.”

“And don’t plant all of the seeds saved from last year.” Niylah cautioned. “Hold some back.”

“We have lots of seeds, so that’s not a worry. We should get some more garden beds going too, especially for the fast growing plants. In-ground should be fine for now, especially if a rainy season does start as long as we plant on a stable elevation. Seeing how things go, we can create some terraced garden beds later this spring along the slopes.”

“We should keep a list somewhere.” Octavia mumbled around her mug of tea. “Another item to add to that list - materials to make paper.”

“Not just paper.” Diyoza added. “We need to repair clothing, make new clothing, especially as Hope grows. So when you go out on your exploratory trip, keep an eye out for plants we can cultivate for clothing fibers. Food has been our priority, but we also need to think of this too, especially if you don’t find any animals that are suitable for furs.”

Niylah nodded. “I know what type of plants to look for, given that most of what we’ve found here has been similar to Earth. Flax and hemp are most likely in this climate, we can cultivate either or both of them. Both plants also have seeds, which we can use for cultivation and eventually also to make oils.”

“Good plan. The meadow beyond the forest to the north can be a place we can do that, to preserve the quinoa field right behind us.” Diyoza turned to Octavia. “Meanwhile for paper, we can use a variety of tree bark for that, and charcoal to make ink.”

“Okay.” Octavia rested her chin on Niylah’s shoulder. “I feel pretty useless with all of this, only having spent about seven months on the ground.”

“It’s not your fault.” Niylah assured her, turning her head to kiss Octavia’s head. “You’re learning every day. And it’s helping, right?”

“It is. Knowing that so much can grow because it exists in nature rather than a closed artificial environment is reassuring. Nature regenerates. Well, assuming radioactive storms don’t do it in.”

“We haven’t seen anything like that here.” Niylah reminded her, setting her mug down to run her hand through Octavia’s hair. “While it is true we know very little of this planet, we have seen no signs that it is inhabited beyond us. But we will see more once we go up the mountains, right, _ai niron?”_

“Right.”

“In the meantime, we’ll focus on the forest jobs we have here. Tapping the trees and hauling the logs and chopping free the trees that fell in the storms. We’ll make bows and arrows and I’ll teach you how to set traps for small wildlife.”

* * *

Another month passed before the mountains were accessible, and Octavia and Niylah bundled a week’s worth of provisions into satchels, ready to head out on their first journey.

“Keep each other safe.” Diyoza said, worry suddenly crossing her features. “I don’t want to explain to Hope that her aunties just vanished and left us alone.”

“We’ll come back.” Octavia promised, kissing the top of Hope’s head. “Don’t worry.”

“Safety first. Always.” Niylah agreed, giving Hope a kiss of her own. “No unnecessary risks. We’ll come home to our family.”

They both embraced Diyoza, and it was time for their journey to begin.

Octavia led the way down the narrow path towards the stream from which she drew water every morning, that much of their trip was familiar to them. But once they followed it up the mountain and crossed it at a narrow point, the terrain was entirely new.

As they gained elevation, they saw their cabin sitting in the small field surrounded by forest on three sides, the lake on the fourth. They could see the Eligius transport crashed against the cliff among the trees, seeing from this angle that a fair amount of the ship had cracked off and spilled its cargo containers along the top of the cliff, a place where they hadn’t ventured yet. Those containers held promise for more tools and comforts, if nothing else.

Octavia pointed out an approach point to get onto the cliff, a slope to the south of the cliff that led to the top. That would be a place to investigate once they returned home. In the meantime, their journey up the mountain continued.

Niylah saw how the forests that surrounded their home for miles did eventually give way to what appeared to be wetlands, a different biome that could hold promise for aquatic animals such as fish and crustaceans, about a two day’s hike from the cabin. She kept thinking she could hear the calls of birds, but so far she wasn’t sure if she was imagining them or if she just wasn’t spotting them.

Once they passed between two of the peaks, however, to see what was on the far side of the mountains next to the lake, that was where a completely new world came into view.

“The Anomaly in the lake must scare them off. You were right.” Octavia said, watching as flocks of birds soared across the forests and meadows below them. The birds never ventured close to the mountains, as if there was some sort of invisible barrier keeping them away.

“Birds can be good food, but we’re most interested in land mammals.” Niylah reminded her. “Let’s make camp here for the night, and we’ll see what we find down there in the morning.”

Niylah built a fire in front of a small alcove while Octavia replenished their canteens from the nearby stream, and they curled into each other as they huddled in the alcove, nibbling on dried jellyfish and handfuls of dried berries.

“With any luck we’ll have some bird meat tomorrow night.” Niylah reminded her. “It’s been awhile, hasn’t it?”

“I’m worried I won’t be able to.” Octavia said honestly. “I know, birds are so different from - from what we ate in the bunker, but they are still more… similar than jellyfish has been. And land mammals worry me even more. I’ve just been thinking of them for furs, not for food.”

Niylah pressed Octavia’s head to her cheek, running her fingers soothingly through her hair. “I’ve been trying not to think about what memories it could bring up too. But we have to face it. And I think if we do it together, it’ll be easier.”

Octavia nodded, tension in her slim frame dissipating with Niylah’s comforting touch on her skin. “I hope you’re right.”

* * *

The next morning, Octavia and Niylah extinguished their fire and wound their way down the new side of the mountain, filling all of their canteens at the stream before they descended into the brush which gave way to forest - a forest made up of completely different trees compared to those on their side of the mountain.

“I’ve never seen trees like this before.” Octavia said, running her hand over one of the trunks. “Nothing like we had on Earth or on the other side of the mountains.”

“The weather is also much warmer here.” Niylah said, pulling off her hood and stuffing it into her pack, her gloves off as well. “It is like the chill and snow we get on the other side of the mountains doesn’t come here at all.”

“Wait, I read something about weather patterns like that.” Octavia said abruptly. “In one of the books in the bunker library. Where it can be cold on one side of a mountain range but warm on the other.”

“Does this mean we should consider building another home on this side of the mountains to avoid another winter like that?”

“Well we’ve only seen this side for one day. We can’t be sure yet what kind of weather dominates here. Today could be a fluke. But if we make a number of trips here over the next year, then we could see.”

“Hope will be walking next winter, just think about what kind of a little terror she might be if she’s cooped up for months.”

Octavia chuckled. “She’s a sweet thing, you know you wouldn’t be able to be mad at her for more than five minutes as soon as she smiles at you.”

Niylah rolled her eyes. “Okay, that might be true. But still. Especially as Hope grows, wouldn’t we want a home of our own? With some privacy so we don’t need to tiptoe around if we want to enjoy each other?”

Octavia grinned as Niylah pressed her to a tree, packs tumbling to the ground as Niylah mouthed along her neck, sucking on a pulse point until Octavia gasped, fingers digging into Niylah’s shoulders.

They didn’t disrobe completely, it was still a bit too cool for that, but after months cooped up in the cabin with limited opportunities to enjoy each other’s flesh, frenzied mouths and hands had them both panting out their release within minutes, and _yes,_ Octavia was forced to agree that a space of their own would indeed be a good thing.

“Now. About that exploring. Hunting. Yes.” Octavia said, brushing her sweaty hair back from her face as she tied one of her sweaters around her waist.

“Shhh.” Niylah hissed, pressing one finger to Octavia’s lips while her other hand reached for her bow. Once Octavia was silent Niylah’s fingers found the quiver and drew an arrow, nocking it in the bow.

Octavia followed Niylah’s slow measured movements with her eyes, not moving herself, and a few minutes later, Niylah released her arrow into the crown of a tree. A flock of birds flew into the air with a squawk, but one bird, with Niylah’s arrow through its neck, tumbled to the ground a few paces away.

_“Yu gonplei ste odon.”_ Niylah whispered to the bird, stroking a reverent hand over its feathers as she pulled the arrow from its neck, wiping it off in the grass and putting it back in the quiver.

She brought the bird over to Octavia, and they sat down on the ground and Niylah showed her how to pluck the feathers, leaving Octavia to do so, clean it and build a fire with which to roast it while she herself took a look around through the underbrush, watching for animal dens as well as different types of plants that could be useful for them, though she suspected those would be closer to the edges of the meadow that was still several miles off from their current position.

Making a wide circle around the clearing in which Octavia’s fire was, Niylah noted several animal burrows - all small animals, but quite likely mammals, given the tufts of fur that she noted on several low-lying branches - and returned to the centre as she began to catch the smell of the roasting bird.

“I had some herbs in my pack.” Octavia said as Niylah returned. “I used them to season it.”

“Good idea.” Niylah took a deep breath. “Smells good. If the birds continue to nest in this area, we’ll shoot some more on our way back up the mountainside if we don’t have any luck with mammals, but I think we will. I noticed some burrows. Once we settle for the night, we can set some traps, check on them regularly.”

“Hope that something larger hasn’t come along to eat them or us.”

“Don’t worry. We lived in woods with wild panthers and all manner of other creatures on Earth. We survived.” Niylah examined the bird over the fire. “I think it’s done. Are you ready to eat your first meat in years that isn’t jellyfish?”

“Or human?” Octavia raised an eyebrow. “It’s okay, you can say it. We both did it.”

“Which is why we’re here, in this beautiful place.” Niylah said, lifting the spit off the fire and coming over to sit next to Octavia. “I wouldn’t change anything.”

“You wouldn’t?”

“No. All of that horror brought us here. A fresh start on a new planet, a family, the woman I love beside me. Peace and not having to deal with people who would interrupt that.”

Niylah tore a piece of the bird off, blowing on it quickly as she bounced it back and forth between her hands as it cooled off so she could hold it, watching fondly as Octavia did the same, and then looked at the meat in her hand with some apprehension.

Niylah touched her piece to Octavia’s. _“Omon gon oson.”_

Octavia closed her eyes. “You say those words, but you don’t want the people that came with it.”

“I only want you. The rest of our people are fine. They’ll live out their lives on Sanctum. You saved them, they aren’t your responsibility anymore. Only we are. So let’s keep our thoughts on this planet, okay?”

“Okay.” Octavia looked at the meat in her hands, and met Niylah’s gaze with her own. “Together.”

“Together.” Niylah nodded.

They raised the meat to their mouths, took bites, chewed, swallowed.

It was so different, and the worries that Niylah had had flooded away, and by the expression on Octavia’s face, she could see the same held true for the former queen.

“This will be okay.” Octavia whispered, taking another bite. “It’s not the same at all.”

“It isn’t. I’m glad.” Niylah kissed Octavia’s cheek, leaving a smear of bird grease behind which she then licked off, making Octavia giggle. “We’ll be all right, _ai niron._ Bit by bit.”

“I’m starting to believe that.”

They finished their meal, and Niylah wrapped up the bird bones in a piece of cloth, stowing them in her pack. They’d be useful to make tools such as needles.

As they traipsed through the forest towards the meadows beyond that they’d seen from the mountain, both of them kept their hands on their bows, ready to hunt. There were no signs of large game, but under Niylah’s direction, Octavia made her first bird kill, just as Niylah had earlier. They’d bagged four more birds of the same type as the one they’d eaten earlier by the time they made it to the edge of the meadow.

“This is a good place to set up camp for a few days.” Niylah declared. “We can smoke the birds, and any other game we catch in our traps. Let me show you how to set the traps, and then while you prepare the meat for smoking, I’ll look through this part of the meadow for familiar plants.”

They shed their packs, and worked together to set up a number of traps within a few hundred metres of their camp. Octavia found a long and flat rock which she dragged back to the camp. Once she had plucked the birds, she used its surface to thinly slice the meat, setting up one campfire for smoking, layering the meat on a variety of greenwood racks, which she covered over with a strong canvas material they’d salvaged from the Eligius III transport. Feeding the fire every few hours would result in good smoked meat that they’d be able to pack away the next morning and bring back to the cabin, to rehydrate in soups and stews.

Meanwhile, Niylah roamed the meadow, taking note of the different plants. It was still early in spring, so few would be mature at this point, but she recognized a number of plants at their early stages, what resembled flax among them, enough that they would be able to harvest the plants and seeds in a few months, putting the fibers to use already this year, while they could plant the seeds closer to home.

She also saw some early growing greens she knew as _sora_ on Earth, and picked the leaves, tasting one and being pleased by the familiar sour taste. They could stew some of those with their meat this evening, harvest more over the course of the rest of the days, bring the seed-filled flowers back to their side of the mountain, and continue to harvest more any time they returned here. It was a fast growing plant that Niylah remembered her mother braiding and drying over the hearth to use in winter as well. They’d had little by way of greens this past winter, so the addition of this to their diet would be particularly helpful.

Niylah heard a scream when she was still a few hundred metres from the campsite - she could see the smoke from the fires.

It could only be Octavia.

Niylah ripped her bow from her back as she started to run, nocking an arrow in place, picking up her pace until she burst through the tall grasses into the campsite.

Her heart almost stopped as she saw a large beast on top of Octavia, but saw her arm move, so she was still alive, though it appeared that the beast no longer was.

“Octavia!” Niylah yelled, rushing over, pushing the beast off of her lover carefully. “Are you all right?”

Octavia winced as she sat up, and Niylah saw blood streaming down her chest, soaking into her sweater. “It got me in the shoulder. I think my shirts took the brunt of it, but it did get me with some of its claws.” She looked down at the blood coating her other hand, the beast’s blood, the hand where she was clutching her knife. “Lucky I had this in my hand when it attacked.”

“Let me take a look. You don’t feel any poison?”

“No, just wounds.” Octavia shrugged her shredded shirt off her shoulder, letting Niylah get a better look at the claw marks. They weren’t too deep, but if Octavia hadn’t been wearing several layers, it could have been worse.

Niylah fumbled through her pack for a clean cloth, and wet it, pressing it to the wounds. “Hold this here. I saw a plant nearby that acts as a disinfectant. It’ll sting, but we should clean the wound with it before I bandage it. Don’t let go of your knife, in case there are more.”

“Not planning on it.”

Niylah scrambled into the nearby grasses, looking for the plant she remembered, stripping a few stalks, glad that it was already growing at this time of year, and returned to Octavia. She took one of the stones from the fire, doused it with water to cool it off, and ground the leaves of the plant into a paste, applying the paste to Octavia’s wounds after she washed them clean. She saw Octavia grimace, but she didn’t complain as Niylah tore an arm off an extra shirt and wrapped it around her shoulder.

“I hope that will hold. You need to be careful. We’ll change the bandage in the morning.”

“Even if we catch something in the traps, I don’t know if we’ll be able to haul everything home, now that we have this.”

They made their way over to the beast that had attacked Octavia, its stomach slit open by Octavia’s knife, guts spilling out into the ground, where they hadn’t already drenched Octavia’s clothes. Unlike all of the familiar plants on this planet, this beast was not familiar to either of them. Its fur was a dense black, and while the build resembled that of a panther, the face was entirely different, and it had no tail or whiskers to speak of.

“This fur will be good.” Niylah said. “We can begin to cure it here, but we’ll finish the process when we get home. As much as I’d like to get you home right away so we can take care of that wound in familiar and safe surroundings, I also don’t want to you to move in this state, not with everything we have to haul.”

“I’ve been through worse, _ai niron.”_ Octavia reminded her. “Or do you forget the day you and Clarke brought me back from the dead?”

“And then how I hauled your ass all around the Ark looking for Ilian?” Niylah raised an eyebrow. “That wasn’t a good idea then, and it isn’t a good idea now. We’re staying put, but we should sleep in shifts, just in case the beast had friends.” Niylah pulled her satchel of greens off her shoulder. “I found these, and they’re quite good stewed. Do you think you’d be able to prepare them with some of the meat and herbs for our dinner while I skin the beast?”

“I think so. Got a small pot here somewhere.”

“Good. I want to get it skinned before dark, so best move quickly. I’m glad you’re okay. I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you.” Niylah kissed Octavia’s forehead.

_“Ai hod yu in, Naila.”_ Octavia said, kissing her back.

_“Ai hod yu in seintaim, Okteivia.”_

* * *

After Niylah finished skinning the beast, Octavia set up a third fire on which to smoke its meat, while Niylah stretched the pelt out between some trees.

“Let’s eat before we carve it up.” Niylah said, ushering Octavia away from the carcass on the carving rock. “You need your strength.”

“I’m not an invalid, _ai niron._ Just some scratches.”

“I just… it scared me.” Niylah said honestly. “I was just remembering how cavalier you were with your life before we came here, and… I don’t want to go back to that.”

“I want to live.” Octavia said, lifting their dinner pot off the fire with a stick. “I will be careful. I promise. I love you, I love Diyoza and Hope. But I am stronger than glass. I won’t break from just a few animal scratches.”

* * *

Octavia was true to her word. They took shifts sleeping during the night, but there was no sign of any other beast like it. But they no longer split up during the day, instead checking the traps together in the morning and before nightfall, packing their smoked meat carefully and hanging it in trees to keep it away from predators while they were still camping in the area. The rest of the days they’d spend foraging for _sora_ and the disinfectant plant Niylah had found, braiding the _sora_ and hanging the braids over the tops of their smoking fires to begin to dry, while grinding the disinfectant plant into a paste which they wrapped up carefully in large leaves.

They lingered several days longer than intended, which made Octavia worry for what Diyoza would be thinking, but Niylah assured her that when they made it into the mountains they’d camp on the cabin side, where Diyoza would be able to see their campfire.

“I’m not letting you move until I’m happy with how your shoulder is healing.” Niylah said sternly. “When you can put a pack on it, then we can go, and no sooner. We have a lot to bring back.”

Niylah was right on that front - they’d brought several extra packs with them for supplies, and Niylah loaded Octavia’s extra packs with as much of the lighter items as she could - the braids of _sora,_ the disinfectant packets, some of the small animal furs - carrying the heavier dried meats and the large beast pelt herself, to reduce the strain on Octavia’s shoulder.

They drenched the fires at the campsite, but left their camp setup in place, knowing they’d be back within the next few months, this was a good place for so many things that would be good for their family.

Spending one last night on the mountain - where they saw the familiar fire and candlelights from the cabin down below, as well as the light of the Anomaly in the lake - when morning dawned, they made their way carefully down the mountain, finally stumbling into the clearing of the cabin in late afternoon.

Diyoza flew out of the cabin as she heard their voices as they dropped all of their packs, her face softening in relief when she saw they were whole.

“You’re days late.” Diyoza scolded, looking them both over. “What happened?”

Niylah pulled the dense black pelt from her pack and dropped it at Diyoza’s feet. “Our first day on the ground on the other side of the mountain, Octavia was attacked by this. I wanted her shoulder to heal a fair amount before subjecting it to heavy packs.”

Diyoza went over to Octavia with concern, and Octavia rolled her eyes as she pulled aside her shirts to show Diyoza the healing gashes on her shoulder. Diyoza tsked a bit as she saw they were rubbed raw from the pack.

“Got anything to put on them?” Diyoza asked.

“As a matter of fact we do.” Niylah said, reaching into one of Octavia’s packs. “We found this plant I’m familiar with from Earth. We made a lot of paste packets of it, keep them somewhere humid so they don’t dry out. I’ll put some more on the wound right now before we do anything else.”

“So there are animals on the other side of the mountains?” Diyoza said. “More than just this one creature?”

“Yes. Birds, small mammals too.” Octavia said, wincing as Niylah rubbed the paste into her shoulder. “We’ve got lots of dried meat in Niylah’s packs. Can use it in soups and stews. Or just eat it as is, if you want…” Octavia trailed off as Diyoza opened the pack and already shoved a piece in her mouth, eyes closing in pleasure.

“Do you know how long it has been since I’ve had meat like this?” Diyoza asked.

“Over two hundred years?” Octavia raised her eyebrow.

“In terms of time awake, not as recently as you all were eating people. Meat was scarce before the apocalypse. If you weren’t lucky enough to be able to hunt it, it was expensive to buy.”

“Was there anything good about Earth before the bombs?” Niylah asked.

“Sure. If you were a generation or two older than me. They lived the good life. But when it came down to me, then things sucked and there wasn’t anything that could be done to reverse it. Save for the apocalypse.”

“That did appear to restore some balance to nature.” Niylah said. “But now we have a new Earth. And things on the other side of the mountains are quite different from here. Completely different ecosystem.”

“With things we can use, apparently.”

“Quite a lot, yes. It is still early spring, so in terms of plants, all we had to harvest right now were _sora_ leaves and the disinfectant, but if we return in a few months there will be more, including flax. We’ll bring the fibers back, and we can use the seeds to plant on this side as well. But also plenty of birds and mammals.”

“The Anomaly might be keeping them away from this side.” Octavia elaborated, sitting down on one of their benches. “The birds would fly close to the mountains, but never past them.”

“Interesting.” Diyoza said. “What about on this side? See anything interesting?”

“Wetlands about two day’s walk from here. Could hold promise for marine life.”

“Still about as long a trip as over the mountains for mammals.”

“Yes, but also easier terrain. Possibility of using sleds for transport.”

Diyoza nodded. “Octavia, go keep an eye on Hope and rest your shoulder. Niylah and I will get these things put away.”

“I’ll restretch all of the pelts, so we can finish preparing them.” Niylah said. “Under the overhang at the back of the cabin should be good.”

Octavia headed into the cabin to find Hope asleep in her cradle, teething ring clutched in her small hand. She rocked the cradle gently, not sure how long Hope had been asleep, or how long she was still expected to be out.

“Don’t worry, Auntie O and Ani N came back.” She whispered to the little girl. “We’re all okay. But I’ll need to tell you the story of how Auntie O fought off a fierce beast with only a small knife.”

Diyoza bustled into the room, dividing the dried meats between different storage containers, most emblazoned with the Eligius logo. She was reminded of what else they’d seen.

“Oh yeah, there’s more to the Eligius transport.” Octavia said to her. “Part of it broke off at the top of the cliff. We saw a path that could bring us up to the top of the cliff to retrieve any surviving supplies from there.”

“Good. You can do that when you’ve finished healing.”

“Like I told Niylah, I’m not glass. I’m fine.”

“Yes, I’ve heard all about how you tried to save the Ark with a stab wound through your gut and then fought in the Hunger Games a week later.” Diyoza’s expression softened as she knelt down next to Octavia. “But you don’t need to do that now. We can rest. There’s nothing mission critical that can’t be done by me or Niylah, there’s no deadline, there’s no panic. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Good.” Diyoza touched Octavia’s cheek fondly and returned to her work.

* * *

Octavia and Niylah made their second trip over the mountain two months later, when Niylah estimated that the flax would be ready to harvest, along with more of the _sora_ leaves and other assorted plants. Diyoza had her hands full with the growing garden and a mobile Hope, as she’d begun to walk and was even starting to run.

“You sure you’ll be okay?” Octavia asked before they left.

“I can manage a week.” Diyoza said. “Now go on. You girls could use some alone time, I’m sure.” She winked at Niylah.

“Thank you.” Octavia kissed Diyoza’s cheek, and Hope’s, and they were off.

The journey up the mountain was easier this time, their route already known and marked from their previous journey. Octavia wanted to go all the way down to their camp by the meadow on the first night, but Niylah convinced her to stay that night in their same alcove on the mountain.

“Remember what our first mission is when we get down there.” Niylah reminded her. “So that we don’t have the same incident as last time.”

“Yes, I know. We’re building a hut of our own. But how is that going to help? I was attacked in broad daylight while working by the fire.”

“It means a defensible place for us to retreat to if we need to, as well as a safe place to spend the night without needing to constantly be on watch. We also have multiple fires now, for extra protection. All important things to be aware of for safety.”

“I’m more worried about you, traipsing through the meadow. That beast came out of nowhere, what if one attacks you?”

“I was lucky last time, it’s true. But I will either walk with my knife in my hand, or with you on guard next to me.”

“Don’t you forget it.” Octavia snuggled into Niylah’s shoulder. “It’s such a different world, over on this side. Doesn’t have the same serenity as our side, but at the same time it has a different sort of peace.”

“You mean not having the Anomaly in front of you day in and day out.”

“I do mean that. On this side, I see all the life and creatures that avoid it, and… is it good for us to be living next to it?”

“Octavia Blake, are you really suggesting that you want to move _away_ from the Anomaly? The place you look at longingly, knowing your brother is on the other side?”

“I don’t know. It’s just an idea. Maybe not until we’ve explored this side in more detail, not until we know it is safe for a child to be here. Not until we build a home with a safe territory so that she won’t be attacked.”

“We can suggest it to Diyoza, and work on it over the course of several years. There’s nothing saying it isn’t a possibility for the future.”

They fell asleep against each other, and awoke the next morning to a clear sky and the sounds of a living forest ahead of them as they made their way down the mountain. They’d shot five birds by the time they made it to their old campsite, and set up the smoking tents right away.

After setting up the birdmeat to smoke, Niylah set traps in the forest while Octavia unearthed and shifted large rocks and logs in the same vicinity, never being far apart from one another for safety’s sake. Once the traps were set, they worked together to bring all the rocks and logs to their campsite, where Niylah pulled out a pack of soft clay from their side of the mountain, and they used it to cement a foundation of rocks together around a shallow pit lined with soft leaves and fir needles, made to make a bed. They braced the inside of the rock walls with some split logs, and used the longer split logs as a ceiling over their hut. They saved one particularly wide one for the door.

“There.” Niylah said, wiping her hands off on some nearby leaves. “We’re ready to spend the night here.”

“Together.” Octavia said, voice dropping an octave, as she pulled Niylah’s hips to her own. “Just the two of us. No interruptions.”

“You’re getting clay all over my pants.” Niylah chided.

“Who says you need to be wearing pants?” Octavia teased. “There’s no one here but us. The weather’s warm.”

Niylah rolled her eyes. _“Okteivia._ We still have jobs to do today. Tomorrow we can frolic in the meadow without any clothes.”

“Promise?”

“Mmmhmm.”

“What else do we still need to do today?”

“I’d like to pick some _sora_ before the sun goes down. See what else has blossomed this month.”

“What about the flax?”

“On our last day. There’s a lot of work we need to do when we get them back home, and the fresher the better.”

Niylah and Octavia wandered through the meadow, Octavia keeping guard with her bow and arrow at the ready, knife in her belt, while Niylah harvested _sora_ leaves, and pointed out other plants to Octavia - most useful were various bushes of legumes, including green peas, green and yellow beans, and what she knew as _gabanza,_ but she was sure that Diyoza would provide another name for them.

“The _gabanza,_ we can harvest those and dry them now.” Niylah pointed. “But the others are best fresh, so we want to take those on our last days. We’ll definitely want those seeds for planting in our garden. Oh!”

“Oh what?” Octavia asked, swinging the point of her bow around, worried by the sound of Niylah’s voice, but there was no danger to be seen.

“Corn.” Niylah said, looking at several two-foot long stalks with growing protuberances that Octavia had only ever seen in books. “Not ready yet, but if we come back in a month, month and a half, they should be ready. We definitely want to take corn back to our side of the mountain, it will help reduce our reliance on the quinoa. Another food that can be used as a grain-type base for a meal. Together with the _gabanza,_ that might be our most valuable find this trip. Dried _gabanza_ will be important for protein in the winter - they can be cooked with vegetables, or made into flour and then fried, there’s all sorts of possibilities.”

“We’ll have meat too though, right?”

“Yes, but we have to eat that more quickly than _gabanza._ We’ll eat meat for the first months of winter, and then _gabanza_ and jellyfish after that. Many different sources of protein. That’s better than just one, right?” Niylah stroked Octavia’s hair as she averted her gaze, worries getting the best of her. “I know how worried you were over the winter, with just the jellyfish, even though Diyoza promised that the quinoa also had protein. And we didn’t run out of either of them. The quinoa field is already producing again, and all of that is being saved for winter, since we still have plenty of it to eat from last year’s harvest.”

“So we’ll have meat - both bird and mammal - as well as dried jellyfish, quinoa and _gabanza?”_

“Yes. We’ll be just fine.” Niylah kissed the side of Octavia’s head. “We’ll be feasting all winter. Nothing to worry about.”

“I’m not worried.”

_“Okteivia,_ I know you. I know you still worry. But we’re doing everything we can to alleviate that worry. We’re building that addition to the cabin, a cold box where we’ll be able to store more food. I believe Diyoza said it was similar to a refrigerator. A box accessible from inside the house but that can be full of snow to freeze and preserve food. We’ll make our last trapping trip of the year over to this side when the frost and light snows come, and then we’ll bring fresh game back home. Diyoza would like that, she hasn’t had any.”

“Will we have enough containers to preserve everything? We barely had enough last year, after losing that one box of berries to mold.”

“We still had enough berries to last the winter.” Niylah reminded her. “We were still all right. But yes, we will have enough containers. Remember the trip we made up to the top of the Eligius transport.”

A week after they’d returned from their first trip across the mountains, Diyoza deemed Octavia’s shoulder healed enough to go on a salvage mission to the Eligius transport, following the path up the cliff that they’d observed from the mountains. Niylah and Octavia had found a great bounty of supplies up there - plenty of sturdy containers, most of them still airtight, that would be perfect for them to store their winter supplies. Additional tools and more metal sheeting also came back with them, key to expand their cabin and others that would be saved to improve their camp on this side of the mountain.

As summer dawned, Octavia and Niylah had also made a trip to the wetlands, where they harvested seaweed which could also be dried - a saltier alternative to the _sora_ \- and upon finding the water itself to be saltwater, began to debate how it would be possible to retain and harvest that salt itself.

After cooking up some of the crustaceans they found in the water - the likes of which neither of them had ever had before, but Diyoza had drawn pictures of what she’d hoped they’d find - Octavia and Niylah made a plan for their next few days - eat what fresh foods they could forage from the forest, and use their pot to boil the saltwater down and down until they could fill one of their buckets with good dried salt.

It was a plan that worked - the sleds they’d brought with them, along with lids for their collections of buckets - meant that they pulled five buckets of fresh crustaceans - still live, in water - and one bucket of salt back to their cabin, along with other fresh greens and legumes they were able to harvest along the way.

_(Gabanza _didn’t grow wild on this side of the mountains, but both Octavia and Niylah had recognized soy. They didn’t intend on bringing it back to plant, there were still too many bad memories associated with it for that, but they did bring enough of a harvest that they’d be able to eat them only. Diyoza didn’t question their recalcitrance to grow it.)__

__(Okay, she did, but only privately to Niylah, and she quietly informed her that soy had been their protein plant in the bunker, and Octavia feared the same type of fungus wiping out their food supplies, so soy was only to be prepared and eaten soon after harvest, never to come into contact with any of their other food.)_ _

__They’d dined on fresh crustaceans for a week - Diyoza said it was one of the best meals she’d ever had, having seen plates of the creatures being served to the rich in the years before the bombs - and all of their bellies were well-satisfied - as they had been since arriving on the planet._ _

__But still Niylah would find Octavia in their storeroom, or looking at their shelves, counting, counting, counting. She didn’t know what else she could do to make it easier for her._ _

__“Come on. That’s enough foraging for today.” Niylah whispered, taking Octavia’s hand in one of hers, using the other to sling her foraging bags over her shoulder. “Let’s get these things drying on the smoke fires, and then you can get me out of these clothes before dinner.”_ _

__Octavia surfaced from her worrisome melancholy with a devilish smile. “All right. I’m in.”_ _

__They ran their way back to their campsite, where Octavia braided the _sora_ into its drying braids, while Niylah shelled the _gabanza,_ dumping them onto a long piece of metal that she set over their cooking fire to dry and roast._ _

__The sun had started to go down as Niylah finally let Octavia pull her towards their hut, hands everywhere, dropping packs, pulling off shirts, pushing down pants, until they finally tumbled in the door of the hut, taking only the briefest of moments to drop a blanket over the scratchy leaves and fir needles before being consumed with each other._ _


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Note:** Should go without saying that nothing written in this fic should be taken as foraging. hunting or medical advice. This is fiction, and I'm not a farmer, hunter, gatherer or medical professional. If you want to live off the land or explore non-hospital medical techniques, please consult professionals to learn how to do that.

Niylah awoke to a buzzing in her ear. A bee had somehow made its way through the cracks of their rudimentary door, and buzzed its way around their heads. Octavia groaned as Niylah shifted against her, trying to swat the bee away.

“Why?” Octavia complained, pressing her face to Niylah’s bare chest, the night having been warm enough that they hadn’t gotten dressed again, just a blanket covering them.

“There’s a bee in here with us.”

Octavia tugged the blanket over their heads with one hand, resuming her snuggle. “There. Now it will go find something more interesting.”

“We can’t stay here for forever.”

“A bit longer.” Octavia’s tongue darted out to lick a path of salty dried sweat from between Niylah’s breasts, a remnant of their previous night’s exertions.

“Okay, maybe a bit longer.” Niylah murmured, pressing her lips to the top of Octavia’s head, letting herself doze as they enjoyed the feel of each other’s skin.

Eventually they did extricate themselves, going through their morning routine of checking their traps, preparing the meat of their kills for smoking (and for lunch, they’d dallied that long in bed) and the pelts for tanning. Once they’d eaten their lunch of grilled meat and freshly picked green and yellow beans, they headed into the meadow for their daily foraging.

Niylah wielded the bow and arrow today, as Octavia gathered more _sora_ leaves, as well as both the seed pods and greens of mustard plants and the pods from another patch of _gabanza_ plants.

When they made it back to their camp, Niylah showed Octavia how to shake the seeds loose from the mustard pods, storing them up in some smaller jars, both for planting by their cabin and to use a sharp and pungent spice. To demonstrate their flavour, Niylah ground some with her mortar and pestle and spread the resulting paste onto their dinner meat, roasting it over the fire as Octavia prepared a pot full of stewed mustard greens and peas with herbs.

After their dinner, as the sun began to set, Octavia rested her head on Niylah’s shoulder, looking up into the sky and the ever present ring around the planet they found themselves on.

“I feel guilty.” Octavia said softly.

“Why?”

“We’re here, living well, living in peace… but back on Sanctum, with everything Gabriel told us… we should want my brother to be here. It’s not safe there.”

“He’s not a Nightblood.”

“No, but they can change that, just like they did with Clarke. And that’s a planet full of toxins and eclipses and a society that is full of problems, and then the Children of Gabriel on top of that… why shouldn’t we want our people to come here instead?”

“They made their choice.”

“How can it be that simple?”

_“Okteivia…_ I was there, that day when you asked Wonkru to choose. If they were Wonkru or if they were the enemies of Wonkru. I was there every day after that, when people still had to make that choice. In the end, most of them have chosen to be enemies. If they’d trusted you, we never would have needed to leave Earth. We’d be there now - or rather, we’d be dust in the wind now, because we would have long since passed and our children would have inherited the valley.

“But since they didn’t, since they chose otherwise, since they chose to cast you out… what marvels you’ve found aren’t theirs to lay claim to anymore. They are not your responsibility anymore. What’s that phrase Diyoza likes to use? They made their beds, now they can lie in them. Harsh, perhaps, but apt.” Niylah turned her head to kiss Octavia’s forehead, arm tight around her shoulders. “And it means I don’t have to share you with them. Only with Diyoza and Hope, and they appreciate and love you too, the way you deserve to be loved.”

“You make everything sound so easy.”

“It can be that easy. We have a good life here, the two of us and Diyoza and Hope. We have more food than any of us have ever seen, we have a home, we have fresh air and forests to roam without threats to worry about. That’s more than any of us have had in many years. And of course we have each other.”

“There are threats, _Naila._ You know that.”

“Only on this side. We haven’t seen any on the other side.”

“I still wouldn’t let Hope play in the woods alone though, just in case.”

“I don’t think Diyoza will either. She’s still a baby, and even as she grows older… it’s prudent for there to always be teams of two when going into the forest.”

“We’ll teach Hope everything there is to know about the forest?”

“Of course we will. That’s what aunties are for.”

* * *

Octavia and Niylah passed their week on the other side of the mountain without incident, trapping animals and foraging by day, making love in their hut by night. As morning dawned the day of their departure, they went through their routine, storing away the necessities for smoking in their hut so they wouldn’t need to build and carry them across the mountain anymore.

One last check of their traps, and they were also stored away in the hut after their catches of the day were skinned and roasted on the fire in the early morning light, protein for them to eat on their way through the forest and up the mountain. Each woman was laden with a number of packs, filled with smoked meat and pelts; fresh beans, peas and mustard greens; dried _gabanza_ and _sora;_ smaller jars of mustard seeds and disinfectant paste; fresh flax plants, picked just that morning as they waited for their morning catch to roast.

“We really need to plant the flax on our side of the mountain, for more clothes for the future.” Niylah said as they harvested. “How much this will be good for, I don’t know. We’ll need to come back next month, to harvest more, but hopefully that will do us until we can grow a field of it closer to home.”

“There’s that meadow north of the lake.” Octavia said. “Past the quinoa.”

“I’ll ask Diyoza about that, see if she knows how well the plants might co-exist. We don’t want one to overtake the other, since we need them both.”

“There’s also the area near the wetlands, but that’s still a long trip.”

“We’ll find someplace, _ai niron,_ don’t worry.”

“I’m not worrying.” Octavia smiled, a real smile that put Niylah at ease. “I think, just looking at all we have - I am starting to learn how to not worry.”

“That’s good.” Niylah stopped her work to pull Octavia close, kissing both of her eyelids as Octavia closed her eyes in comfort at her touch. “You’re healing. We both are. We all are. This is what I want for you. For us.”

“I know. I’m finally starting to believe it can be real.”

“I’ll continue proving it to you, every day. Now I think we have as much as we can carry for today, let’s grab our breakfast and be on our way.”

“Of course, _ai niron. Ai hod yu in.”_

_“Ai hod yu in seintaim.”_

* * *

As late fall descended on their home, and each evening brought a chilly wind with frost, Octavia and Niylah returned from their final expedition over the mountains for the year, shaking snow from their furs as they returned to the cabin, having been caught in a short storm in the mountains.

“Fresh meat is yours if you want it.” Octavia said, unslinging her largest pack and passing it over to Diyoza. “Nothing over there but meat right now, everything else has gone to ground, like we expected.”

“But we did meet another of the beasts that attacked Octavia in the spring.” Niylah said. “We were prepared, no injuries, but a nice pelt and good meat.”

“Good.” Diyoza said, taking the pack from Octavia. “We should keep the snow you’re scattering on the ground for the ice box.”

“Already ahead of you.” Niylah unslung three of her packs. “All of the fresh meat is packed with snow, and ice. I’ll take them to this side of the ice box, pack them in.”

Niylah disappeared around to the ice box, letting Diyoza choose which meat to cook for dinner from Octavia’s snow-filled pack, and then wrapping the rest of it carefully, nestling it in the snow between the blocks of ice. It was cold enough outside that it was just barely melting. It would do until the snows came down the mountain, which would be any day now.

Octavia dropped her packs of smoked meat in the storage pantry area of their cabin, trusting Diyoza to put them away once she had dinner on, and then returned outside to chop more firewood, they already had a lot stacked both inside and outside, but it was a commodity there could never be enough of. This year their firewood storage area was enhanced by additional metal sheeting, expanding the area to twice its size, and Octavia intended on filling it to capacity.

She could have stayed to put the meat away, she supposed, but Octavia was actively trying to avoid worrying about their supplies. She knew there were many more storage containers than the previous year, she knew there were more vegetables in the cool cellar than there’d been the previous year, she didn’t need to count them, so she stayed away.

But it still hovered in her mind. Was that fear something she’d ever be free of?

A howling gust of wind almost yanked the axe out of her hands, and she doubled down, putting her worries out of her mind to chop the last log that they’d prepared over the summer. That would be the last that they’d need to fill their firewood storage area. They were equipped for a long winter.

The sun had almost disappeared behind the mountains when she finished, shoving the last logs into the storage area, making sure the metal door was closed carefully, to avoid any night snows from making it inside. It wouldn’t be long now, the snows had caught them in the mountains, it might even be their last night without being locked inside.

Octavia entered the cabin, making sure to secure the door against the wind, pulling off her furs and hanging them by the fire to dry, where Niylah’s already hung. The inside of their cabin was good and warm, metal shutters already fixed over the windows.

“I think the snow might come tonight.” Octavia announced.

“Seems likely.” Niylah said. “Seeing what we saw in the mountains today, tonight is possible, no more than a matter of days at any rate. But we’re ready.”

Octavia took a few deep breaths. “That’s right. We’re ready.”

“You need some sweets.” Diyoza said, coming out of the other room, where she’d put Hope down to sleep. “When I was a kid, sugar was at a premium. But now look, we’ve got those bottles of syrup. We can have pancakes every week all winter, no problem.” She pointed to the shelf next to the fireplace. “In addition to this box of crystallized syrup, which we can just enjoy in pieces on its own.”

Diyoza broke off a chunk of the crystalline substance, passing it to Octavia as Niylah ladled out a mug of fruit tea for her.

“Wood storage shed is filled.” Octavia said. “Wouldn’t be able to jam another log in there if we wanted to.”

“Then we are indeed ready.” Niylah repeated. “You agree, right, _ai niron?”_

“I do.” Octavia took another deep breath, closing her eyes as she sipped her tea. “I know we’ve got even more supplies this winter than we did last year. I know we’re all right.” She opened her eyes again, looking at Niylah sitting next to her, at Diyoza across the table. “I know. But that doesn’t make it easier for my mind to believe it. Will I ever be free of these worries?”

“It’s natural for such worries to last for awhile yet.” Diyoza said, reaching out her hand, rubbing Octavia’s wrist gently. “I have bouts of worry sometimes too. But we have to remember that we know this world now. Even if something were to happen to our stores here, we have options. We would not starve. They’d be unpleasant options with going out in snowstorms, to carve bark from the trees and to break holes in the ice to fish for jellyfish, but they could be done. We’re not in a zero-sum world.”

Octavia nodded, feeling Niylah rest her chin on her shoulder, stroking one hand along her other arm. “That does make it easier. Knowing that we’re not trapped under the ground like we were, with no chance for escape. It might have been easier to manage, had we had a way out after those five years.”

“You’re welcome.” Diyoza said, smirking.

“We are grateful that you opened the bunker.” Niylah said. “But what I don’t understand is why you weren’t willing to share the valley. Why you broke your agreement with Bellamy.”

Diyoza shrugged. “I don’t even know anymore, to be honest. At the time it seemed like a good idea to get the doctor and get out. I had too many internal conflicts among the prisoners to deal with to worry about adding another group of unknowns to the equation. But your people won, and mine lost in the end, right? And now we’re all here, which is much better than what was there.”

“This is a better place.” Octavia said, trying to push worries about her people and their potential lives in Sanctum out of her mind. Or who used to be her people, perhaps Niylah had been right months ago when she said that they’d chosen their path, and they weren’t for Octavia to worry about anymore. “You are our people now.”

Diyoza smiled. “You’re my people too. Now, to not stay all sappy, remember that we have lots of work to do this winter.”

Niylah rolled her eyes. “And by ‘we’ you mean me.”

“Neither Octavia nor I have ever woven cloth.” Diyoza said. “So it does come down to you teaching us how to do it if it isn’t to be just you.”

“I can sew, I made all of our fur jackets and pants, but I’ve never woven anything.” Octavia said. “But I do want to learn.”

“Well luckily we did get the loom finished. I’m not sure how much cloth we’ll be able to get out of the flax, but now that we’ve got all of those spools of thread we’ll be able to find out. They’ll be pretty drab clothes though until the spring, when we can find out what dyes we can make from the plants.”

“Functional is what matters.” Diyoza said, picking at her threadbare shirt. “These Eligius clothes are only going to last so long. Given how time moves here, it’s a miracle they even survived this long in that shell of a transport.”

“We have furs now, next spring we can focus on leathers instead.” Niylah said. “Removing the fur from pelts will be harder, but we can make better pants than we’ll be able to from the flax. Sturdier, should last several years at least.”

“We’ll need that new flax field in the spring.” Diyoza said. “Hope will really start growing and we’ll need all the clothes we can get to keep up with her.”

“Those are problems to worry about in spring.” Octavia said, resting her head against Niylah’s. “We’ve got a winter to survive first.”

“You were going to write your novel in your free moments.” Niylah teased. “We did press all that paper for a reason.”

“Not a novel.” Octavia chuckled. “I’m not sure I have those kinds of stories in me. But I do want to record all of the stories of old that I heard as a child, so that we can tell them to Hope too. The stories of the ancients of Earth. Perhaps we can also create our own legends of this world.”

“See, you have a story creator within you, not just a storyteller.” Niylah whispered. “This winter, I weave, you write, Diyoza cooks.”

“Thanks for that job.” Diyoza scoffed. “Don’t I get a fun different role too?”

“What do you want to do?” Octavia asked.

“I want to create more of the games that I played as a child.” Diyoza declared. “We have some of the basic ones, dice games, playing cards… but there are more that I remember. You might even like them, some of them tie into these stories you’re so keen on recording.”

Octavia and Niylah exchanged a look. “Sure, I guess we could do that too.” Octavia said. “Anything to pass the winter days and nights.”

“Oh, I’m sure you two will find ways to pass those winter days and nights.” Diyoza gave them a look. “Just save it for when Hope and I are already asleep.”

We’ll listen for your snores.” Octavia teased, resting back into Niylah’s arms. “There’s a reason we sleep on the roof in the summer.”

“Hey, I’m not the only one who snores.” Diyoza mock-glared at the two of them. “Your lover snores louder than I do.”

“But she’s melodic about it, she doesn’t sound like someone’s feeding metal to a boar.” Octavia teased.

“Ouch.” Diyoza scoffed. “That hurts.”

“There is a tree bark tea that could help with that.” Niylah offered. “I know you haven’t wanted to try the tree bark drinks I’ve made, but I promise this might taste better than the regular stuff. Some fruits and some chillies to add a bit of kick. Drink it before bed and it could clear your sinuses so you can rest more easily.”

“I might consider trying it.” Diyoza acquiesced. “Next time you hear _metal being fed to a boar,_ then I’ll try it the following night.” She promised.

* * *

Two months into the storms, the cabin was a flurry of activity, as the women worked on their different projects and Hope scurried around and around, one of the women detailed to always work close to the fire to keep her safely away from it.

Today it was Octavia, sitting at her small worktable, her back warmed by the fire, as she kept one eye on Hope - who was tugging at her mother’s shirt right that second - and the other on the paper and ink in front of her, as she started recording yet another story from the myths and legends that Bellamy had raised her on.

“I know what we should call our home.” Octavia called out. “It just came to me, with this next myth.”

“Oh?” Niylah asked, setting down her shuttle and stick and coming over to her, kissing her temple. “What would that be?”

“Hesperides.”

“I know that story.” Diyoza said, picking Hope up and swinging her onto her hip. “Three maidens in a garden, guarding a golden apple. Hercules came and stole it.”

“Well, with any luck Hercules won’t be coming here. But yes. And in some variations of the story, there are four maidens, like there are four of us here. We’ve got that gold metal orb in the cellar. That could be our apple.”

Niylah nodded thoughtfully. “You could be right. A very appropriate name.”

“I still wonder what that orb is for.” Diyoza said, glancing at the trapdoor. “It isn’t easy to move, but it is possible to shove out of the way. We know that much. The symbols must mean something.”

“Seems like someone else was trying to figure that out too, judging from the markings on the walls.” Niylah said. “Perhaps the last person who lived here. Perhaps the person before them who built this cabin.”

“Gabriel did say that other people had gone through the Anomaly. Probably ended up here.” Octavia said. “But if time moves so quickly here, then they’d be gone and dust before even an hour passed on Sanctum.”

“It’s incredible to think that such a thing is possible.” Niylah said. “I mean, yes, stars and moons and planets all throughout the cosmos, but to be able to travel to a completely different one just by stepping through a green light…”

“They called them wormholes in the books I read growing up.” Diyoza said. “Didn’t know they were actually possible, I thought them science fiction that would never come true. But then, I also travelled across space in cryosleep for hundreds of years and mined an asteroid, the existence of wormholes can’t be outside the realm of possibility.”

Octavia put her pen down and rested her head against Niylah’s shoulder as she slid onto the bench next to her. “We’ve been here for a year and a half, yet in Sanctum it could be that Gabriel’s still standing there staring after us. Not even thirty seconds will have passed for him.”

“I wonder if he’ll finally come through. He might not realize that time moves so differently.”

“Thus why we need to keep a written record here.” Octavia said, indicating her papers. “Not just of the stories, but our story. For the people who come after us. It might… it could help them know what to eat and what not to eat, it could tell them about the seasons and the history of this place. And what our lives here were like.”

“Now that’s something that we can work on.” Niylah nodded. “But it will be a long term project, since our story is not over.”

“So right now I’ll stick to the myths and legends. Make some storybooks for Hope.”

Hope squealed at her name, reaching her hands out towards Octavia, and Diyoza passed her over before she toppled off of her hip. Octavia received the little girl, cradling her in her arms and dropping kisses on her forehead.

“Aunty O is going to make some storybooks for you. Would you like that?” Octavia murmured.

“Sto-weeee.” Hope giggled. “An-eee O stow-eeee.”

“That’s right. I’ll read you so many stories.”

“We’re going to need more paper for that.” Diyoza said.

“We will. But this year was the first time we made it, it’ll be easier next time.” Octavia answered. “We’re learning more and more about the seasons and weather patterns here. It’ll have been two years almost when the snows melt since you got here, Diyoza. We’ve observed the same things each year. So it is important to start to make the paper just after the snows recede, because if we wait too long, we’ll get into the rainy season and it’ll never dry properly. If we’d started earlier we would’ve had more.”

“Fair enough. Not much to do in the gardens yet at that point anyway, just planting the early crops. And no berries or other fruits or vegetables we need the screens for yet. So perfect time to make the paper.”

“We also need an addition to the cabin come spring.” Niylah added. “This place is already getting pretty full, and if we want to make books and if we want to have a place to store the loom during our summer activities, or even out of the way during the winter… we need an addition.”

“I agree.” Octavia nodded. “We’ve limited our salvaging from the Eligius transport to just the necessities, but if we have an addition, we can bring more things over, even things we don’t have a use for yet, just so we have them on hand already for when we do.”

“And so you can have your own private room for yourselves.” Diyoza gave them a look. “That’s got to be some of it too, right?”

“As Hope gets older, we’ll all want more space.” Niylah said diplomatically. “If we add on a large enough space now, we’ll be able to use it for storage as well as for our beds, and when she’s old enough, Hope can have her corner behind the firewood like we have right now.”

“Fair point.” Diyoza conceded. “I remember what I was like as a teenager and I can’t imagine wanting to share a bedroom with my mother then.”

“If we build it over there, where that window is right now, and move those shelves, then they can move to the inside of the room, and we can have a small cellar as well.” Niylah pointed. “It’ll be sufficiently spaced from the other one. Two independent storage spaces are better than one.”

“Can’t argue with that.” Octavia said, kissing Niylah’s cheek. “The more options, the better.”

“You realize with all of these projects, you won’t be able to make as many excursions this year as last year, right?” Diyoza said. “We need to do a lot more planting this year - the corn and the flax in fields plus new garden beds for the legumes - and with papermaking and addition building, that is going to take a lot of time.”

“Fair enough.” Octavia said. “We make one excursion to the wetlands between two longer trips across the mountains instead of five shorter ones like we did this year. That way we can hunt and harvest _sora_ and salt and seaweed but still spend more time here.”

“Good plan.” Diyoza agreed. “We’ve got our work cut out for us, but I think we can do it.”

* * *

The storms lasted two weeks longer than the previous year, but just as they were beginning to worry if they’d ever stop, they did - just as before, suddenly and without warning a bright day dawned overhead, and the quartet stumbled outside, blinking in the sunlight.

“I never thought I’d be so happy to see the sun again.” Diyoza said, closing her eyes as the sun warmed her face. “At least we still had plenty of firewood.”

“Now you know how we felt when the bunker was opened.” Octavia said, nuzzling into Niylah’s shoulder as Hope clung onto her hand.

“Aunty O! Aunty O! Twees!” Hope babbled.

“Yes, trees.” Octavia said, letting go of Niylah and crouching down next to Hope. “And you know what we will do with trees today?”

“Get see-wup fom them!”

“Yes, we are going to get the sap.” Octavia encouraged. “Do you want to see?”

“Yes!” Hope looked up at Diyoza. “Mommy yes?”

“Go on.” Diyoza said. “Aunty O will give you a piggyback ride so that you can see what she and Ani N do to get the sap.”

“Getting started right away are we?” Niylah raised an eyebrow.

“We made our plans. We’ve already lost two weeks. No time to waste.”

Niylah rolled her eyes and went back inside for the sap buckets while Octavia positioned herself so that Hope could jump onto her back.

“Let’s goooo!” Hope exclaimed.

“We need to wait for Ani N.” Octavia admonished. “What’s the rule?”

“No alone in the fowest.”

“Good. Even for grown ups. Always go with someone.”

“Ani N Ani N! Let’s goooo!” Hope yelled as Niylah came out of the cabin with the buckets.

“Lead the way, Ani N.” Octavia said, waving her arm with a flourish as she bowed.

Octavia and Hope followed Niylah into the forest, and they wove their way through the trees. Once they got to their first marked tree, Octavia swung Hope around onto her hip so she could watch as Niylah worked, tapping the tree gently and inserting the spile, Hope watching with rapt attention as the sap began to flow into the bucket.

“Oooooh.” Hope marveled. “See-wup!”

“Sap.” Niylah corrected again. “We take it home and boil and boil and boil it on the fire, and then we have syrup.”

“On pancakes?”

“Maybe mommy will make pancakes tomorrow.” Octavia said. “You have to ask her really really nicely, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Good girl.” Octavia kissed Hope’s forehead. “On to the next tree, little one. Get back on.”

Hope swung her arms back around Octavia’s neck and Octavia shifted her back into position as they moved on to the next trees, one after another, before returning to the cabin, where Diyoza lifted Hope off of Octavia’s back as they got there.

“Looks like you wore Aunty O out.” Diyoza said. “She looks tired!”

“Mommy make pancakes!” Hope demanded. “Aunty O need them!”

“Is this your order for breakfast or hers?” Diyoza asked, raising her eyebrow even higher than Niylah could.

“I asked her to ask you to make pancakes _tomorrow.”_ Octavia emphasized. “And that she had to do so _really really nicely.”_

“Pweeeeese.” Hope begged. “Pweeeese Mommy?”

“Okay, little one. I’ll make pancakes tomorrow.”

“Yay!”

“Now why don’t you go with Ani N and she’ll get you today’s breakfast.”

Diyoza passed Hope along to Niylah, and they made their way towards the outdoor fire, while she herself turned back to Octavia, all business.

“The logs?”

“Didn’t go anywhere over the winter. Not to worry.” Now it was Octavia’s turn to raise a curious eyebrow. Wasn’t like Diyoza to worry like this. “We’ve got that bin of woodchips, but we need more for more paper. I’ll get to chopping those logs this afternoon, garner us more woodchips and start refilling the woodshed.”

“Good. Now we can have breakfast.”

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d think that you were starting to worry. It’s just the first day after the snows. We’ve still got months ahead of us to do everything we need to.”

“You’re not wrong.” Diyoza said sheepishly. “I just… panicked, when the snow didn’t stop right on the dot of the same time it did last year. I know seasons have variations, they did on Earth even before climate change. I know we had plenty of food and firewood to last months more. But just thinking about everything that needs doing made me worry for a bit.”

“We do this together.” Octavia reminded her. “That’s what you’ve been telling me. Both of you. You’ve reassured me about the food for years now. So if Niylah and I have to bust our asses for the next few weeks getting back on schedule, then we’ll do it, okay?”

“Okay.” Diyoza smiled. “Thank you. For not laughing about it.”

“I know what it’s like to worry. I wouldn’t do that. We’ll get it done.”

* * *

A month later, all of their projects were in full swing, and each of the women collapsed into bed exhausted every night, bodies exhausted and worn out from working morning to night on each of their projects - be it digging garden beds, boiling sap for syrup, digging the foundation for the addition, boiling woodchips down to pulp and pressing sheets of paper.

So as tired as their bones and muscles were, Octavia was surprised to wake up in the pitch dark one night to the feel of Niylah’s fingers slipping over her bare hip, far under their blankets.

“You awake, _ai niron?”_ Niylah whispered into her ear, grazing it with her teeth.

“I am, but I don’t know how you have any energy for whatever you might be encouraging.”

“It’s been weeks since we’ve had the opportunity to feel each other. It’s late, Diyoza is asleep.”

The roar of the snores from the other room confirmed it. Diyoza had still been quite recalcitrant at taking that tea.

“Okay but you’re doing all the work.” Octavia mumbled, even as she turned to face Niylah, hitching a leg over her hip to give Niylah easier access and slipped one of her own hands down the front of Niylah’s pants.

Octavia felt Niylah smile against her cheek. “Oh really?”

Octavia’s fingers found Niylah’s clit, rubbing against it with her knuckles, but then stilling. “Really.”

Niylah whimpered, shifting her hips so that Octavia’s fingers pressed more firmly against her clit. “Damn, you are going to make me work for it.”

“Yup.”

Niylah reached her one of her hands down her own pants, adjusting Octavia’s hand where it rested against her, hooking two fingers into her, while the knuckles of Octavia’s other fingers continued to rest against her clit. She jerked her hips a few times, murmuring in satisfaction. It would do.

She returned her attention to the hand on Octavia’s hip, slipping it down between Octavia’s legs, finding her panties damp as she slipped her hand into them.

Octavia might not have wanted to be particularly active, but she was still most certainly turned on.

She touched a soft delicate fingertip to Octavia’s clit - just one fingertip, nothing more, as she rubbed soft circles on it, enough to elicit a faint moan from Octavia’s lips. She stilled her finger, rolling her own hips against Octavia’s hand, feeling the fingers within her shift a little to push deeper, and Niylah smirked. For all of Octavia’s posturing, she was still ready to give as much as she got.

Niylah kept rolling her hips against Octavia’s hand as she began to circle Octavia’s clit with her own fingertip once more, keeping just the softest possible touch on there, wanting to drive Octavia mad with desire - it had been too long since they’d been able to properly enjoy one another’s bodies, consumed with tasks as they were.

But Octavia had patience that Niylah had never seen before - of course she’d seen Octavia’s iron will in other more trying circumstances, but never before in bed. Save for that one soft gasp, no further sounds passed Octavia’s lips, nor did her hips search for firmer contact.

If it weren’t for the fingers driving her wild right that second, Niylah would have thought that Octavia had fallen asleep. 

Octavia’s long and skillful fingers drew out Niylah’s orgasm as it hit her, leaving her panting and trembling as it lasted longer than most ever had, even throughout their years together.

“I’m… doing… the work… is that right?” Niylah panted, pressing sweaty kisses along Octavia’s neck.

Octavia smiled against her ear. “I aim to shock and awe.”

“And what about you? I believe I promised you satisfaction.”

“You did.”

“You’re not begging for more.”

“I’m patient. I like feeling you, there’s no need to rush to the finish line.”

“I’ll take my time then.”

“Mmmm.”

Niylah was true to her word, continuing to touch Octavia with just the lightest of touches, ghosting her lips over Octavia’s neck and lips, throwing their covers off to run her lips lower and lower, eventually tugging Octavia’s pants down and replacing the delicate touch of her finger on Octavia’s clit with an equally light press of her tongue, her fingertip hovering just barely inside her now.

After those untold minutes of stillness, Octavia’s hips finally shifted to wordlessly ask for more, and Niylah responded, plunging three fingers in deep as Octavia clenched around her, the tap of her tongue sending her into spinning into oblivion.

Niylah rested her cheek against Octavia’s sweaty thigh, licking one finger after another clean as Octavia’s fingers scratched through her hair. As the minutes passed, Niylah felt Octavia’s skin make the shift from hot and sweaty to what would soon become cold and clammy, and she pulled herself up, pulling Octavia’s pants up as well and settling against her side, yanking the blankets back up over them as the slight chill started to settle back in.

“I love you.” Octavia said simply. “I thank the universe every day for the fact that you’re here with me.”

“I love you too. There’s nowhere else in the universe I’d rather be than right here with you.”

“What about… our own private room?”

“All good things in time. We need to see how the foundation survives the rainy season before we build past the floor. We may need to make adjustments.”

“But after that?”

“Yes, after that. Don’t worry, _ai niron._ I’ve done this before, I helped my parents build a good deal of our home in the forest. A place far away from everyone else.”

“You grew up in almost as much isolation as I did.”

“Perhaps. But it wasn’t to hide me or my brother. It was to hide my parents and their relationship.”

“You don’t really talk about them. I mean, I know your father died in the massacre my brother participated in, and that your mother was taken by Mount Weather, but… why were they hiding?”

“My father was Trikru, my mother was Azgeda.” Niylah said, running her fingers along the length of Octavia’s arm as they cuddled together. “Their love was forbidden, and so we lived where it was easier to hide my mother’s scars. No village would have taken us.”

“Mmmmm.” Octavia hummed. “I know a thing or two about forbidden love.”

“Lincoln.”

“After the truce, when he lived in Arkadia, it was easier, but still not good. Most of Skaikru still didn’t trust him, even if the Council and the Guard did. Not to mention that when we were actively at war with Trikru after we landed, I’d sneak out to see him, Bellamy would keep telling me not to, but I would. Earned me the nickname Grounder Pounder from the other delinquents.”

“Grounder Pounder? Really?”

Octavia chuckled. “Yup. Not the most creative, but hey, can’t argue with the truth of it.”

“I often wondered why you took so intensely to our ways, rather than the ways of your people. It took me a long time to realize that they weren’t really _your_ people. Just like I lived my life disconnected from both Trikru and Azgeda for the most part. I was _of_ them, but I wasn’t _one_ of them.”

“When did you begin to understand?”

“The day you saved me from them. When you took one of Skaikru’s spots in the bunker and gave it to me.”

“I trusted you more than I trusted any of them. And I was right to.”

“It’s brought us here. I wouldn’t change anything. Well, maybe not quite true. I wish the path to this place, to this peace, hadn’t involved all that pain.” Niylah kissed Octavia’s temple. “That day in the mess hall on the ship, it is still one of the worst days of my life. I thought I was going to lose you and I was powerless to stop it.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You’re the one who suffered, why are you sorry?”

“Because I wanted it. I didn’t think, I - I didn’t realize that there was still someone who cared whether I lived or died.”

“Would it have made a difference if you had?”

“If I’d been able to see past the pain holding my mind in its grip? Perhaps it would have. The first time I realized you meant it was when you refused to return to Sanctum and followed me into the forest.”

“I hope I’ve proved it to you every day since.”

“Every day since my mind has been clearer. Growing freer and freer of that pain. You are a big part of that. Of course so are Hope and Diyoza, but you’re the biggest part. Thank you.”

“Thank you for this great and wonderful adventure. Now sleep. Don’t forget about all our work tomorrow.”

Octavia groaned. “I can’t wait for next winter so we can get some rest.”

* * *

Rest for Octavia ended up coming sooner than they’d intended.

As the rainy season drew to a close, Octavia and Niylah had made their first excursion over the mountain, spending almost two weeks in their meadow hut. Along with their regular trapping, they had ventured further across the meadow, and taken down several large previously unseen beasts, herbivores, that had been grazing at a distance, their hides perfect for the leather that Niylah was tanning.

However, this came with a difficulty - more to haul back across the mountain. While they managed all right on the way up, having brought along a number of canvas throws salvaged from the Eligius transport, with which they could pull along some of their goods instead of carrying them, this system did not work as well on the way down, and as they neared the bottom of the mountain, as they crossed the stream that Octavia drew water from each morning, her haul caught on a rock as she lifted it over the water and Octavia went down hard on the opposite side of the stream, the weight landing on top of her.

“Octavia!” Niylah panicked, dropping her packs and diving across the stream, pushing the haul off of her. “Octavia!”

“I’m fine.” Octavia said. “I didn’t hit my head - oh, _ow.”_ She looked down at her left arm - what she’d used to brace herself during the fall, where the heavy weight had fallen to pin her to the ground.

It was evident that at least one of the bones in Octavia’s wrist was broken.

“Okay, come on, let me see.” Niylah sat down next to Octavia, feeling the injury site, seeing where the bone edges were displaced. “Okay, it seems like a clean break. That’s the good news. The bad news is it is going to hurt as I reposition it, and then I’ll have to bind it tightly so that it doesn’t shift.”

“Do it.”

Niylah placed both of her hands on Octavia’s arm, feeling her fingers towards the edges of the fracture, pushing hard and fast to align them again as Octavia winced.

“It’s done. Okay, now to bind it…” Niylah ripped off part of her sleeve, binding up Octavia’s wrist, then reached for a nearby branch, stripping off the leaves and pressing that to make a rudimentary splint, binding that tighter.

“That’ll have to do until we make it back to the cabin. What can you carry, if anything?”

“I can take my packs, I just can’t haul that canvas bundle.”

“Okay, leave it to me. We’re almost home. We can do this.” Niylah stood up, and helped Octavia to her feet carefully, checking if she had any other injuries, but she couldn’t see anything immediately evident.

“You sure the rest of you is fine?”

“Left ankle is a bit sore. But I can walk on it, it’s fine.” She took a few steps to prove it, though she was clearly favouring it.

“I’m going to look at that too once we get back. But let’s get that done first before we worry about anything else.”

Niylah crossed back over the stream, retrieving her packs and bundles, hauling the bundle of leathers in different stages of preparation through the stream. She’d worry about drying them later.

Octavia led the way through the forest, left arm clutched to her chest, as Niylah hauled the big bundles behind herself, one rope in each hand. It took them longer than Niylah would have liked, Octavia’s ankle was most certainly _not_ fine, but soon they made it into the clearing of the cabin and Niylah breathed easier.

Diyoza was already bustling up to them by the time Niylah hauled her bundles up the last slope, tsking at them, taking Octavia’s wrist in hand to examine it.

“We’ve got some proper splints in the house.” Diyoza said. “How long ago did this happen?”

“Just up by the stream.” Octavia said, gritting her teeth as Diyoza probed at the injury site. “Really, it’ll be fine. I just need to sit down.”

“Over there, let us rewrap it, drink some anti-inflammatory teas to keep the swelling down. Plenty of foods with antibacterial properties too, that’s important to keep any potential infection at bay. Also keep it elevated as much as you can.”

Octavia headed to the outdoor seating area, shedding her packs as she went. She collapsed onto the bench and raised her wrist above her head, kicking off her boots to take a look at her ankle, prodding at the swollen flesh.

Diyoza slipped inside for their prepared medical kit, and came back outside, sitting down next to Octavia, while Niylah hauled their packs and bundles inside. Thankfully Hope was napping in the other room.

“Okay, let me see.” Diyoza said, unwrapping the makeshift splint, feeling along the bone. “Looks like Niylah set it well. But without the material to make a proper cast, we’re going to have to improvise. I’ll splint it with these stiff bark sheets, and wrap it with bandages dipped in resin. That’s as firm as we’re going to get.”

Diyoza busied herself working on Octavia’s wrist, heating up the resin in a small pot in the fire to make it more pliable. It was warm and sticky against her skin at first, but then began to harden, keeping the splint and bandages firmly in place. Not quite the plaster casts she’d seen in films that Bellamy had been able to bring home on his tablet sometimes, living on the Ark, but close enough. Her wrist wasn’t moving in any way.

“Okay. Done. Back to keeping it elevated.” Diyoza said, as Octavia draped her arm over the top of her head. “I’m going to take a look at your ankle now too. Looks just sprained, but always best to check.”

Diyoza poked and prodded at the swollen and bruised skin around Octavia’s ankle, but nothing moved in a way it shouldn’t move, so she slipped Octavia’s sock back on and brought a stool over so that she could elevate it as well.

As they finished up, Niylah came out of the cabin, a steaming mug in her hands, which she handed to Octavia. “Anti-inflammatories. Drink up.”

“Thank you. And I’m sorry, for the setbacks this might cause.”

“We’ve done well.” Niylah assured her. “You picked the right time to hurt yourself, if there ever is such a time. A few weeks with nothing but gardening and weeding, some quinoa harvesting. Stay off your ankle for a few days, sitting on the edge of the garden beds while weeding one-handed if you must, but don’t take anything more strenuously than that.”

“What about the addition?”

“I’ve been checking the foundation each day, it’s solid and we’re good to go.” Diyoza said. “Can you sand boards one-handed? That’s what we need on that front right now.”

“I can try.”

“Good. Healing first, though. Nothing strenuous until we see how you’re healing. Any pain, any numbness, any inflammation, you tell us at once.” Niylah sat down next to Octavia and rested their foreheads together. “Promise? Any sign of trouble, tell us right away so we can help.”

“I will. I trust you both.”

“Good.” Niylah captured Octavia’s lips in a soft kiss. “Now go lie down for awhile, with both limbs elevated.”

“In my bed.” Diyoza added, as Niylah helped Octavia to her feet. “Hope’s napping in hers right next to it. Someone should be there when she wakes up.”

“While you finish your tea, I’ll rig a sling that you can place your arm in while laying down.” Niylah said. “Come on.”

Octavia leaned on Niylah as they walked, the best she could, while holding one arm above her head and the other clutching her mug of tea. She was sure it looked ridiculous, but this was her family here, no one would laugh at her.

She sat down on the end of Diyoza’s bed, watching a sleeping Hope with a fond smile, while Niylah made use of some protruding nails at just the right height to pin a little hammock just above the head of the bed where Octavia could rest her arm.

“Get some rest, _ai niron.”_ Niylah said when she was done, giving Octavia another kiss as she settled into place. “Rest, and we’ll take care of things.”

Octavia found it difficult to doze with her arm raised over her head, but she did what she could, propping her ankle up on an extra pillow. She watched Hope, and saw that the little girl was beginning to wake, rubbing at her eyes before she opened them to spy Octavia in her mother’s bed.

“Aunty O?” Hope asked curiously. “Where Mommy?”

“Mommy’s outside, little one.”

Hope clambered onto the bed next to Octavia, following the line of her arm to where it was raised in the sling. She reached to touch the makeshift cast, but Octavia pulled her hand away gently with her good hand.

“Don’t touch. Aunty O has an owie.” She sat up, showing Hope the full extent of the cast around her arm. “I fell on some rocks and CRACK!”

“It bweak? Like twees?”

“Just like trees. But people’s bones shouldn’t do that. So Mommy put this on it to make it better.”

“So no more bweak?”

“It will take weeks. But yes, hopefully soon no more break.”

Hope snuggled into Octavia’s chest, wrapping her little arms around Octavia’s body as far as they could reach. “Get bedder Aunty O.”

“I will, little one. It’ll just take time.” Octavia dropped a kiss on the top of Hope’s head. “Time means that we get to play more while Mommy and Ani N work.” She whispered conspiratorially.

“I get wides?” While all of the women gave Hope piggyback rides, the ones Octavia gave were always Hope’s favourite.

“No, sorry. Not right now.” Octavia held up her wrist. “Too much owie. But we play in other ways, okay?”

“Ways that don’t huwt Aunty O.”

“That’s right.”

“Stowwy?”

“You want a story?”

“Yeah!”

“Okay, little one. Let’s get comfy and I’ll tell you a story.”

Octavia sat up in a position where it was easier to elevate her hand, propping her ankle up on some pillows as Hope curled up in her lap. She told Hope one of the old classics, about the hero Perseus fighting the Gorgon Medusa, who could turn people into stone.

“Can we dwaw?” Hope asked. “I want pick-tues!”

“You want to draw pictures of Medusa?”

“Yeah! To pwotect us! We put them on the wall outside.”

“Okay, well, if we can mix up some new paints, then I suppose we can make pictures to protect us and turn any bad people into stone.”

“Yay!”

Niylah bustled into the room with a new steaming hot mug in her hands. “What are my favourite girls up to?”

“Medusa!” Hope exclaimed. “To pwotect us!”

“Medusa is going to protect us?” Niylah raised an eyebrow.

“Hope wants to make drawings of Medusa to protect us and put them outside.”

“I see.” Niylah handed the mug to Octavia. “This one is stronger. Antibacterials, just in case.”

“Thank you.”

“Now, Hope, can you go outside and see Mommy? She might have something special for you.”

“Yes Ani N!”

Hope clambered down from the bed and raced out the door while Niylah sat down next to Octavia, pulling back her sock to take a look at her swollen ankle.

“It’s fine, _ai niron.”_ Octavia told her. “Really.” She took a swig of the drink and grimaced. “What all did you put in here?”

“Garlic and chillies for the most part. Some oregano. Oh, and cranberries.”

“That’s disgusting.”

“That’s natural antibiotics. We don’t have the medicines here that I gave you in the bunker after you decided to fight and something got infected.” Niylah chided. “I don’t want to lose you.”

Octavia gave her a look. “If you didn’t lose me after that cliff fall where you and Clarke brought me back from the dead, and then you hauled me around the Ark to find Ilian, and the place blew up anyway… I don’t think a simple broken wrist is going to do me in.”

“Better safe than sorry. You’re not invincible.”

“Maybe not, but I do have a lovely nurse taking care of me who will make sure that I stay safe and healthy.” Octavia smiled as she gave Niylah a long kiss. “We’ll be just fine.”

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from “Carry You” and “Where We Come Alive” by Ruelle.


End file.
